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Rong-zom-pa’s Ontological Abyss: Where the Positivistic Ontology of the Tathāgatagarbha School and the Negativistic Ontology of the Sarvadharmāpratiṣṭhānavāda School Meet

  • 불교학리뷰
  • Abbr : Critical Review for Buddhist Studies
  • 2017, (21), pp.85-107
  • DOI : 10.29213/crbs..21.201706.85
  • Publisher : Geumgang Center for Buddhist Studies
  • Research Area : Humanities > Buddhist Studies
  • Received : April 26, 2017
  • Accepted : May 30, 2017
  • Published : June 30, 2017

Dorji Wangchuk 1

1Hamburg University

Accredited

ABSTRACT

Several years ago, I have made an attempt to present the various interpretations of the Tathāgatagarbha theory by leading scholars of the rNying- ma school, and by comparing and contrasting them with the interpretations of it offered by those scholars from the main-stream Sa-skya, dGe-lugs, and Jo-nang schools (Wangchuk 2004). There I also pointed out that although Rong-zom-pa, an eleventh-century rNying-ma scholar, was aware of the Tathāgagarbha theory from the Tathāgagarbha Sūtric scriptures, seems to be quite reticent about the theory. He does not interpret svayaṃbhūjñāna in the light of tathāgagarbha (as Dol-po-pa is wont to do) but seems to interpret the latter in the light of the former. In this paper, I wish to take a closer look at how Rong-zom-pa interprets the Tathāgatagarbha theory. My paper is divided into four sections. Section one attempts to provide a brief doctrinal-historical background to Rong- zom-pa’s interpretation of the Tathāgatagarbha theory. Section two deals with his understanding of the Sarvadharmāpratiṣṭhānavāda ontology. The word ontology is used here in the sense of the theory about the true reality of phenomena, and the Sarvadharmāpratiṣṭhānavāda, too, has its own theory of true reality, which, according to Rong-zom-pa, is the “indivisibility of the two modes of reality.” Section three examines briefly how Rong-zom- pa deals with the Tathāgatagarbha ontology. Finally, section four is devoted to answering the question as to whether the positivistic and negativistic ontologies can be reconcilable for Rong-zom-pa. I contend that although the overall philosophical doctrines of the Tathāgatagarbha school and Sarvadharmāpratiṣṭhānavāda school are different, there seems to be one crucial point of commonality, namely, the idea of “substratum-less-ness,” also expressed by Ratnagotravibhāga 1.55-57. It thus appears that the idea of “(metaphysical) groundless-ness and root-less-ness” would play pivotal role in reconciling the positivistic and negativistic ontologies.

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