The Madhyamaka and Yogācāra Schools on Tathāgatagarbha Doctrine

By Dr. James Kenneth Powell II

The idea of the Tathāgatagarbha, the womb or embryo of Buddha, is a central theme of Mahāyāna Buddhism. Without exhaustively investigating the origin of the notion, in this appendix, we will aim to further elucidate differences in understanding of the two schools as they approach the notion of the tathāgatagarbha, the “womb” or “embryo” of full-awakening, said to reside within each sentient being.

The Ratnagotravibhāga/Uttaratantra: Madhyamaka or Yogācāra?

Of the five scriptures of Maitreya, two are held by Gelukpa scholars to be principally establishing a Madhyamaka position. These two are the Abhisamayālaṃkara and the Ratnagotravibhāga. The latter is, known to Tibetan tradition as the Uttaratantra, is one of our principle sources for elucidating the nature of the Tathāgatagarbha.

“..the Abhisamayālaṃkara purported to explain not the literal meaning, but the “hidden meaning” of Prajñāpāramitā, and it was here that synthesis of Madhyamaka and Yogācāra might be effected. The Prajñāpāramitā scriptures are the earliest known Mahāyāna works, and their teaching of emptiness is central to all Mahāyāna works, and their teaching of emptiness is central to all Mahāyāna.

However, their literal meaning having close links with Nāgārjuna, Yogācārins had to account for these ideas in their own distinct way and the AA afforded them an opportunity to do that. Disregarding the literal meaning of the scriptures, they could derive their own doctrines from the same source as their Mādhyamika rivals.”

Madhyamaka the definitive view of Asaṅga and Maitreya? Of course, the fact that Maitreya related the Abhisamayālaṃkara to Asanga, is the basis by which Gelukpa claim that indeed, the definitive (nitārtha) interpretation of Maitreya/Asaṅga’s philosophical standpoint, is that of the Madhyamaka. In fact, it is their contention that indeed, Yogācārin philosophers were basically “disregarding the literal meaning of the scriptures.”

Discrepancy between no-self doctrine and that of primordially awakened nature. One of the seeming discrepancies in Mahāyāna Buddhist thinking for the student of Buddhism is the existence on the one hand of the doctrine of “no self” (anātman) and on the other, the doctrine of the existence of an innate Buddha Nature, said to be an “aboriginally pure mind” of awakening existing within all sentient life.

It is a complicated issue and tathāgatagarbha thought is connected with both views. It is incorrect to view the tathāgatagarbha theory as a school in the sense that Madhyamaka and Yogācāra are Schools. Both of these schools have their own interpretations of this doctrine, in fact.

The root text for this idea is the Ratnagotravibhāga Mahāyanôttaratantraśāstra, called as well in an abbreviated way, the “Uttara Tantra” (Ultimate Tantra). Tibetan tradition ascribes this work to Maitreyānatha, and by Chinese tradition to have been written by a certain Saramati seven centuries after the Buddha’s nirvaa.

Madhyamaka: the definitive stance of Asaṅga and Maitreya. In Tibet, there have existed sharp disputes concerning the issue of which school should be connected with the RGV. While Gelukpa scholars acknowledge that Maitreya, through Asavga initiated the Yogācāra system, their own view was in the end, that of the Madhyamaka. Mind-only was promulgated as an extensive methodology by which to initiate certain types of disciples into the Mahāyāna tradition.

The lack of doctrine concerning the basal consciousness in TGG literature. In China, Fa-tsang (7th century) founder of the Hua-yen (Avataṃsaka) School, connected the doctrine with neither school. It was a distinct teaching, so distinct he declared it the “fourth turning of the wheel of dharma.” It is notable however, that key Yogācāra doctrines such as the three natures, the ālayavijñana, are nowhere mentioned among this earliest tathāgatagarbha literature.

Tathāgatagarbha was absorbed by the Mind-only system. Yogācārin scholars maintaining the existence of the ālayavijñāna claim that the gotra governs the ālaya. The tathāgatagarbha is an “agent” that removes defilments from the ālaya.

Jikido Takasaki states that the tradition started as a distinct tradition, but was later absorbed into the Yogācāra School via the growing tendency to equate the Tathāgatagarbha with the ālayavijñāna, most notably in the Laṅkāvatarasūtra. He sees the RGV as a criticism of the Prajñāpāramitā literature. At the end of chapter one it is observed the Ratnagotravibhāga expresses its purpose which is to “establish the existence (astitva) of buddhadhātu so that one could avoid the faults created by the theory of “śūnya sarvam” [all is empty]....”

In his view, the Ratnagotravibhāga emphasizes “asti” - existence - in contrast to the “śūnya” of the Prajñāpāramitā. He says,

“this ‘asti-vāda’ does not mean the negation of ‘śūnya-vāda’. Rather, the Ratnagotravibhāga regards itself as the real successor to the śūnya-vāda of the Prajñāpāramitā declaring that the real meaning of ‘śūnyatā’ is to know the ‘astitva’ of the Germ having within itself both the ‘śūnya of defilements and the ‘aśūnya’ of the Buddha’s Qualities.”

He then takes the meaning of ‘śūnya sarvam’ as “empty of all kleśas.” The tathāgatagarbha is empty of defilements.

Danger of nihilism in the Perfection of Wisdom literature. The criticism of the Prajñāpāramitā is a criticism not of the works per se, but rather of its “short or unclear explanation.” As stated in previous chapters, the Yogācāra tradition sees itself as a “middle path” between views such as that exemplified by the Sarvāstivāda notion of an ātmavāda of dharmas, which is “abhūtagrāha” - the grasping of what is unreal, and the śūnyatāvikiptacitta - those Madhyamaka whose minds are hurled into emptiness and who reject the existence of the Dharma (bhūtadharmāpavāda). In its terms, jñāna and prajñā are antidotes to both wrong views.

Tathāgatagarbha theory clarifies emptiness. Takasaki sees the root cause in the Saṃdhinirmocanasūtra’s formulation of the three natures (trisvabhāva) theory which elucidates the “niḥsvabhāva” or “non-self-nature” theory of the second turning of the wheel of dharma, i.e. the Prajñāpāramitā. Clarifying śūnyatā is a chief aspect of the Ratnagotravibhāga.

In fact, of it, Takasaki states that the Ratnagotravibhāga unravels the thought of prajña with regard to nisvabhāva doctrine and thus is a “Saṃdhinirmocana” (unravelling the intention) of Prajña just as the Saṃdhinirmocanasūtra is the “uttaratantra” as “the ultimate expression of the śūnyavāda.....” Relative essentialism in the Yogācāra.

By comparison then, with the Prajñāpāramitā, the Tathāgatagarbha theory, in correlation with Vijñānavāda thought came to aquire an aspect of relative “astivāda”, relative “essentialism.” Arising from this occurred an amalgam of Vijñānavāda with tathāgatagarbha. “Āśrayaparavṛtti” (“turning about of the basis”), which describes the awakened state of one who has eliminated all defiling seeds (bijas) according to the Vijñānavāda system, were “borrowed by the Ratnagotravibhāga” from that system.

There are key Yogācāra terms missing from the RGV. However, despite such interrelationships, from the Ratnagotravibhāga, key Yogācāra terms are missing. There is no mention of the ālayavijñāna or trisvabhāva. Takasaki concludes,

“the Ratnagotravibhāga cannot be regarded as a work of the Vijñānavāda.”

From this, he asserts that the garbha theory, though critical of the Prajñāpāramitā view, cannot be linked strictly with the Yogācāra School, and probably precedes it. There is a weakness of a garbha theory devoid of the basal consciousness doctrine. The ālayavijñana is seen as the “complete basis” of all phenomena which are mentated realities.

Because the Ratnagotravibhāga did not include this concept, Takasaki sees a weakness in the garbha theory of the text in its explanation of the gotra theory as the substratum (ādhāra) of the phenomenal world.

Because of this weakness, it was seemingly inevitable that a text would emerge to equate the tathāgatagarbha with the ālaya consciousness. This of course happened with the advent of the Laṅkāvatarasūtra and the Mahāyānaśraddhôtpadasūtra. This event effectively absorbed garbha theory into the Vijñānavāda system, preventing its development as an independent school.

The Laṅkāvatarasūtra expresses the equation of the basal consciousness with the tathāgatagarbha. In the Laṅkāvatarasūtra, the Buddha, when asked whether the tathāgatagarbha is the same as the ego-soul or ātman taught by Indian philosophical schools, he replies,

“No, Mahāmati, my tathāgatagarbha is not the same as the ego taught by the philosophers; for what the tathāgatas teach is the tathāgatagarbha in the sense, Mahāmati, that it is emptiness, reality-limit, Nirvāṇa, being unborn, unqualified, and devoid of will-effort...tathāgatas...teach the doctrine pointing to the tathāgatagarbha to make the ignorant cast aside their fear when they listen to the teaching of egolessness....”

This passage seems to indicate the provisional or introductory nature of tathāgatagarbha thought. It is an approach to lessen the fear of the ignorant. However, the tathāgatagarbha is taught as equated with the ālayavijñana in the following passage:

“[But] when a revulsion [or turning back] has not taken place in the ālayavijñāna known under the name of Tathāgatagarbha, there is no cessation of the seven evolving vijñānas.”

and below this,

“..let those Bodhisattva-Mahāsattvas who are seeking after the exalted truth effect the purification of the Tathāgatagarbha which is known as ālayavijñana.”

“Revulsion” is Suzuki’s idiosyncratic interpretation of “āśrayaparāvṛtti”, the “turning about of the basis” of the ālaya consciousness. At this point, according to Yogācāra teaching, the ālayavijñana dissolves into pure jñāna; discriminative, bifurcating consciousness ceases. ‘Monstrous’ importing of ‘self’ into Buddhism. This equation of the ālayavijñāna with tathāgatagarbha thought, has disastrous implications according to Conze. He states that

“All these theoretical assumptions are attempts to combine the doctrine of ‘not self’ with the almost instinctive belief in a ‘self’, empirical or true. The climax of this combination of the uncombinable is reached in such conceptual monstrosities as the ‘store-consciousness’ (ālayavijñāna)...which performs all the functions of a ‘self’ in a theory which almost vociferously proclaims the non-existence of such a ‘self.’”

The Madhyamaka interpretation of the tathāgatagarbha. The Madhyamaka view of these issues is significantly different. Mādhyamika scholars reject the existence of the ālayavijñāna, allowing for only the six vijñānas of classical Buddhism; there is a danger in it being taken as an “ego self.” Nevertheless, they retain the notion of tathāgatagarbha.

Is the doctrine of tathāgatagarbha an ‘alien’ infiltration into Madhyamaka? Some say that if a school accepts Prāsaṅgika teaching as the supreme doctrine of the Buddha, then, since tathāgatagarbha theory was so prevalent in Mahāyāna scriptures, there was a necessity to re-interpret tathāgatagarbha doctrine in light of Madhyamaka concerns to reject “svabhāva” thinking.

We disagree with this view. Many notions are appropriated, for example, by both Madhyamaka and Yogācāra Schools, from doctrines associated with the First Turning of the Wheel discussed above, and these are all a way of avoiding of the literal interpretations associated with those doctrines. Tathāgatagarbha thought no less, if it is deemed pragmatically useful, may be appropriated within the sphere of Madhyamaka thought.

The inherent ‘essentialism’ in tathāgatagarbha doctrine. The difficulty involves the language used to describe these ideas. As R. F. Olsen notes, the problem for the Mādhyamika with Yogācāra notions of ālaya, vijñāptimātra, etc., is that they are discussed with an air of “realism” and “inherent existence” language. This indeed is a problem, exemplified by comments such as the following from Sthiramati’s Bhāṣya on Vasubandhu’s Triṃśika:

[Others may assert] “The self and phenomena do not exist from the ultimate level” - just like consciousness, “and that which is cognized (vijñeya) also,” thus they have said. This extreme perspective is not admissable. And because of the impossibility that that which initiates conceptualization (upacāra) has no basis for existence (nirādhārasya), then by all means the transformation of consciousness (vijñānaparināma) exists as fact (vastūtaḥ).”

Furthermore this approach is incoherent: “Consciousness too, like that which is cognized exists as conventionally true, but not ultimately.”

Essentialism relative to Madhyamaka thought: Sthiramati. In the passage preceding the above in Sthiramati’s commentary, he refuted a “realistic” or “substantialist” (dravyataḥ) notion with regard to the self and phenomena.

Clearly, in this classical commentary on the doctrine of vijñāptimātratā, he has rejected a “Vedāntinesque” view of consciousness, but he seems to imply by this apparent rejection of what in our view are clearly discerned as Madhyamaka tenets, to associate them with a nihilismistic view. Without some basis (adhāra) for conceptualization, consciousness could not take place.

Candrakīrti’s counterclaim: the ‘syllableless’ dharma. Candrakīrti rejects this idea in his Madhyamakāvatara.

“What hearing and what teaching (can there be) of the syllableless Dharma? Nevertheless the syllableless is heard and taught by means of superimposition (samāropa).”

From the Madhyamaka perspective, teaching doctrines such as the ālaya, tathāgatagarbha, are all well and good, as long as the awareness that they are all saṃvṛtisatya is maintained. Avoiding realism even with regard to his own arguments, Nāgārjuna states,

“Suppose that a magic man created by a magician should prevent another magic man created by his own magic [from] doing something....the magic man who is prevented is empty and the magic man who prevents is also empty. In like manner, a negation of the self-entity of all entities by my statement is possible, even though this statement [itself] is empty.”

The Final issue: is the tathāgatagarbha doctrine definitive or provisional? This is the issue at hand in discussion of tathāgatagarbha: is it taken as realistic or conventional? A clever heuristic device, or a Brahmanical ātman in disguise? How one reads Yogācāra thought will determine one’s view here. Candrakīrti’s false accusation? Ian Harris contends,

“The criticism would be all very well if the Yogācāra of Vasubandhu and Asaṅga held the views attributed to it by Candrakīrti, but this is just not so. They actually agree with him that all dogmas must be, by definition, non-ultimate. They hold that the ālayavijñana itself is overthrown on the path to nirvāṅa.”

While it is true that Yogācāra thinkers declare their doctrines, “verbalized designation” (vyavahāra), what can Sthiramati mean by declaring consciousness “actual” (vastūtaḥ) and reject as nihilistic, the notion that it is merely conventional?

Provisional nature of tathāgatagarbha doctrine: Tsong kha pa. Even the Laṅkāvatarasūtra is not free from dispute. We noted the equation of the ālaya with tathāgatagarbha in that sūtra, but Tsong kha pa’s interpretation of the Laṅkāvatarasūtra in the GSR cites sections of the sūtra whereby it is said that the Buddha taught tathāgatagarbha through his compassion to entice non-Buddhists to Buddhism, like luring deer to a lake by their seeing their own reflection in the water.

The tathāgatagarbha is a quasi-ātman. If the doctrine is taken literally, it would be little different from the ātman theory of Vedic Schools. The real truth behind the tathāgatagarbha doctrine is śūnyatā; apart from all phenomena being śūnya, no sentient being could relinquish defiling obstructions and attain full awakening. Provisionality of the tathāgatagarbha: mKhas grub. mKhas grub rje, in his sTong thun chen mo states that those beings who lack clear vision

“…cannot employ reasoning under their own power to understand the tathāgatagarbha, but following the teachings of the Tathāgata they are said to come to an understanding of it gradually by faith.”

The Laṅkāvatarasūtra’s teaching of the non-existence of external objects and that all is “mind-only” is said to be provisional or interpretable. mKhas grub rje finds scriptural evidence within the Laṅkāvatarasūtra itself which demonstrates the provisionality of the teaching of the tathāgatagarbha doctrine. He quotes the relevant passage:

“Likewise, the doctrine of a tathāgatagarbha has been taught within the sūtras spoken by the Lord; and this the Lord has said to be inherently pure clear light, and hence primordial purity itself, possessing the thirty-two exemplary marks and existing within the body of every sentient being.

How is this tathāgatagarbha advocated by the Lord any different from the self advocated by the heterodox?

The Lord spoke. ‘Mahāmati, the tathāgatas...teach by the word tathāgatagarbha notions such as emptiness, the perfect end, nirvāṇa, nonarising, marklessness, and wishlessness. To eliminate the abode of the fear that the childish have in selflessness, we have taught, via the teachings on the tathāgatagarbha, the state of nonconceptualization... the tathāgatas, in a variety of ways, possessing skill in means, and wisdom of the reality that is the reversion of all misconceived characteristics, that is, of the fact that phenomena lack a self....”

Selflessness reconciled with tathāgatagarbha. Along with that,

“The teachings of other sūtras that there exists a permanent, stable, and truly existent tathāgatagarbha...that is the totality of the Buddha’s qualities and that has existed inherently in the mental continuum of every being since beginningless time, is also said to be only a provisional view, requiring further elucidation.

Ruegg affirms mKhas grub rje’s view by noting that Buddhists had two hermeneutical methods available to them. To make tathatāgarbha theory conform to the pan-Buddhist notions of the selflessness of person (puḍgalanairātmya), they had to teach the doctrine as “interpretable”, “needing further elucidation” (neyārtha, drang don). Its “intentional ground” (dgongs gzhi) is nairātmya, śūnyatā, etc.

The Yogācāra approach is a useful, provisional approach upāya. The Yogācāra teach the non-existence of external objects as an upāya, an approach for those who are excessively attached to external forms. However, “based on the ascertainment that external objects are essenceless, [Cittamātrins] will [eventually] come to ascertain that consciousness [too] is essenceless.”

Crypto-ātman. Ruegg, in distinction to Takasaki, takes up the Gelukpa interpretation. Tathāgatagarbha does not refer to any entity (bhava), but is a “metatheoretical expression.” He addresses the dispute over this doctrine. Was it a syncretism, or “a symbiotic accommodation, with the ātman-doctrine of Brahmanical thought - that is, in effect, a crypto-Brahmanical ‘soul’-theory in Buddhism?”

He notes that the similarities in the description of the tathāgatagarbha and the Brahmanical ātman are striking. The tathāgatagarbha is said to be permanent (nitya), immutable (dhrūva), blissful (sukha), and eternal (śāśvatā). The Mahāparinirvāṇasūtra (likely composed in China) even goes so far as to say

What is called ‘self’ is the tathāgata. Why is this so? The [[[Buddha]]-]body being infinite is free from the blemish of doubt, and it neither acts nor grasps, so that it is said to be ‘permanent’. In virtue of non-production and non-cessation (anutpāda) it is said to be ‘blissful’ (sukha). In virtue of the absence of the impurities of kleśa it is said to be ‘very pure’ (viśuddha). In virtue of the absence of ten marks, it is said to be ‘empty’ (śūnya). Consequently, the tathāgata is permanent, blissful, self, very pure, empty and without marks.”

The Intentional ground of tathāgatagarbha doctrine. That this doctrine is to be taken as “interpretable” (neyārtha) is affirmed by three facts. 1] The doctrine as literal is simply to be rejected by the fact of the pan-Mahāyāna teaching of the selflessness of person and phenomenon, this teaching is universally recognized as definitive (nitārtha, nges don).

2] Further, the non-definitive apparent meaning is related intentionally (abhiprāyika, dgongs pa can) to the deeper implications (e.g. śūnyatā, etc.). 3] Finally, there are countless references among Mahāyāna scriptures which relate the Buddha’s upāya as a means to attract and reach those whose mental continuum is not yet ripe to receive the deepest meanings of his teachings. In this case, the purpose is to attract those who cling tenaciously to the ātman view.

Emptiness in tathāgatagarbha theory refers to the individual mental continuum. The śūnyatā with regard to tathāgatagarbha theory in the Prāsaṅgika system, is emptiness applied to a sentient being’s mental continuum (saṃtāna, rgyud), not the emptiness of phenomena (dharmanairātmya). Only if a sentient being’s consciousness is empty can it change; if it cannot change and evolve, it cannot attain to full awakening.

This emptiness of the mental continuum is what is meant in this system of the mind’s intrinsic purity. As long as the mind remains obscured by karma and kleśa, it is referred to as “tathāgatagarbha;” upon purification by means of the path system, it attains to the “svabhāvikakāya”, the “essence body” of the Buddhas.

The Buddha’s pure mind in that pure state is his wisdom body (jñānakāya), and the two together, “the Buddha’s mind as a flow empty of inherent existence, is what this tradition calls the dharmakāya.” From the Gelukpa standpoint as evinced by mKhas grub’s comments, the teachings concerning tathāgatagarbha which teach that sentient beings are already enlightened are wrong, literally speaking. If this were the case, then there would be no need to practice Buddhism.

Tathāgatagarbha as definitive doctrine. Many authorities of course accept the tathāgatagarbha theory as definitive teaching (nitārtha). This has been a source of constant dispute in Tibet, particularly with regard to the gzhan stong - rang stong controversy. Gelukpa scholars accept the “rang stong” view. Briefly stated, this is the teaching that all entities - the individual and phenomena - are intrinsically empty of inherent nature (svabhāvaśūnya).

gZhan stong: empty of ‘other.’ Jonangpa scholars assert the doctrine of gzhan stong - “empty of ‘other’”. According to this view, there is an inherently existent Absolute. What it is empty of is “other” in the sense of defilements (kleśa). This view is compared to a “jar without water” or a “monastary without monks”. The dharmakāya is conceived by this school as empty of delusional conceptualization of the phenomenal world. It is empty of illusion in its own ultimately pure state.

They interpret the tathāgatagarbha theory as given in the Śrimāladevisiṃāhanādasūtra as teaching that adventitious defilements (āgantuka) are intrinsically other than the ultimate, but this ultimate (dharmakāya) is not inherently empty of its own essential nature. This view is what these traditions refer to as the Great Madhyamaka; Prāsaṅgika Madhyamaka is simply a conventional teaching which is neyārtha - needing interpretation, although useful for clearing away erroneous views initially.

gZhan stong the definitive view of Nāgārjuna and Asaṅga? This view is the final view of not only Nāgārjuna but that of Maitreya and Asaga as well. They claim, that while texts such as the Mūlamadhyamakakārikāḥ teach rang stong, but they cite the Dharmadhātustava, which they attribute to him for their claim that he taught gzhan stong.

Empty of essence or of defilements. As we have seen however, more or less this view of a positively expressed tathāgatagarbha as “empty of defilements” (gzhan stong) rather than “intrinsically empty” (rang stong) is prevalent throughout East Asia. Yet, as we have seen, the issue remains unclear in the field of western Buddhology if resolved elsewhere.