“The Venerable One was from India. When the Thirteenth Patriarch, in the course of his traveling and teaching, reached the part of India where Nāgārjuna was cultivating, the Venerable Nāgārjuna went out to greet him with these words: ‘The deep mountains are so quiet and solitary, the abode of dragons and pythons. How is it that you, who are so virtuous, have strayed so far to come here? What brings you here?’ The Patriarch said, ‘I am not venerable. I have come to see you, Worthy One.’ Nāgārjuna thought to himself, ‘The Thirteenth Patriarch is lying when he denies he is venerable. ’ The Patriarch knew what he was thinking, and Nāgārjuna regretted it, apologizing for being so stupid. The Patriarch immediately transmitted the great Mind-to-Mind Seal to him, and Nāgārjuna and the five hundred who were cultivating the Way with him all received the complete precepts.
“After obtaining the Dharma, the Venerable Nāgārjuna traveled and taught. When he reached southern India, he found the people there preoccupied with the quest for rewards of heavenly blessings and unaware of how to seek the Buddhadharma. The Patriarch told them the meaning of the Buddha-nature, and how their own natures were endowed with limitless meritorious qualities and blessed rewards. When the multitudes heard that Dharma, they all stopped seeking blessings and turned away from the small to go towards the great. Right where he was sitting, the Patriarch made his body look like the orb of the full moon.
The Fifteenth Patriarch-to-be, Kāṇadeva, was in the crowd and remarked, ‘The Venerable One is showing us the substance and characteristics of the Buddha-nature.’ Nāgārjuna thereupon transmitted the Dharma to Kāṇadeva and entered the Moon’s Orb Samadhi, extensively displaying spiritual transformations. Immediately afterwards, he entered cessation.
“His eulogy reads: The Buddha-nature in its meaning neither exists nor non-exists. He made appear Samadhi’s Orb, a coral moon on high. An elder brother in the household, he fell not to biases. Eyebrows both raised and lowered, from one mallet dual sounds… ” (VBS #100 (Sept. 1978) 2)
This is a summary of the philosophical underpinnings of Nāgārjuna’s teachings. [What follows is] “…a synthetic survey (saṃkṣepa) of Nāgārjuna’s chief religious and philosophical persuasions.
“The best starting point for such an exposition is the theory of two truths (satyadvaya): a relative or conventional truth (saṃvṛtisatya) that serves as the means for obtaining the absolute or ultimate truth (paramārthasatya).
“The ultimate goal of all endeavors is the highest good of oneself and of others: abolition of rebirth, or nirvana [i.e., enlightenment]. It implies the attainment of Buddhahood, or a twofold body (kāyadvaya). This may be considered from four perspectives: 1) Ontologically: Allphenomena (dharma) are empty (śūnya) since they lack own-being (svabhāva), inasmuch as empirically and logically they only occur in mutual dependence (pratītyasamutpanna). 2) Epistemologically: The ultimate truth (tattva) is the object of a cognition without an object (advayajñāna), and thus only an object metaphorically speaking (upādāya prajñapti). 3) Psychologically: It is the abolition of all the passions (kleśa), primarily desire (rāga), hatred (dveṣa) and delusion (moha). 4) Ethically: It implies freedom from the bonds of karma but subjection to the altruistic imperatives of compassion (karuṇā).
“The conventional Buddhist means ([saṃ]vyavahāra) devised for the fulfillment of this objective may be classified variously, but fit most briefly and comprehensively under the heading of the two accumulations for enlightenment (bodhisaṃbhāra): 1) “Accumulation of merit (puṇyasaṃbhāra). This comprises four perfections (pāramitā): Liberality (dāna) and good morals (śīla), which are mainly for the benefit of others, and patience (kṣānti) and energy (vīrya), which are for one’s own good. Their practice presupposes faith (śraddhā)in the ‘law’ of karma and results in the attainment of the physical body (rūpakāya) of a Buddha. Along with the pursuit of meditation (dhyāna), the fifth pāramitā, this constitutes temporal happiness (abhyudaya). 2) “Accumulation of cognition (jñānasaṃbhāra). This consists in ecstatic meditation (dhyāna) surpassed by insight into the emptiness (śūnyatā) of all phenomena (dharma), or wisdom (prajñā). This is the ne plus ultra or ultimate good (naihsreyasa) of all living beings. It amounts to the attainment of a ‘spiritual body’ (dharmakāya).
“In other words, cognition of emptiness and display of acts of compassion are—to the chosen few—the two means of realizing enlightenment.” (Lindtner, Chr. Master of Wisdom: Writings of the Buddhist Master Nāgārjuna, xx-xxi).
龍樹《菩薩》