Nagarjuna and the Art of Negation: Discerning Subjectivity, Emptiness, Transcendental Ethics, Tetralemma Logic, Binary Logic, Self-being and Negations
Author:
Mathew Varghese
ISBN:
9788190995054
Binding:
Hardcover
Year:
2020
Pages:
275
Size:
14 x 22 x 2 cm
Weight:
424 grams
Price:
INR
995.00
Reading the philosophy of Nagarjuna in retrospective, his method of Nagarjuna is variously explained in this book. How the application of tetralemma—four-value structure (catuckoti) would give us enough resources to expand our thoughts and how that could help us negate the binary either/or structure of thought that demands theoretical postulations. Notably, the art of logical negation used by Nagarjuna employing neither/nor structure would help us understand the Middle Path (Madhyamika) philosophy clearly. Most of the philosophies use the structure of two-value logical interpretations to introduce their metaphysics and ethics. Metaphysical conception of soul—God is the basis of virtue ethics centred on transcendentals of goodness, truth, beauty, unity, justice, being, etc. of the classical Greeks, later being followed by Christians, Jews and Islamic thinkers. The conception of atman-Brahman is the foundation of Vedic philosophers’ understanding of transcendentals as truth (sat), consciousness (cit) and bliss (ananda), Nagarjuna, on the other hand, employs negative dialectics to confute the logical structure of either/or that demands metaphysical concepts; and by employing the four-value logical structure, he introduces the transcendentals as wisdom and compassion. This book uses Nagarjunian art of negation to reread his philosophy differently to discern the concept of emptiness (sunyata) as the co-dependent evolution of various elements of the subjective self and the elements of objective experiences in the dominion of the subjective self and the elements of objective experiences in the dominion of the subjective self; therein it is possible to redefine no-soul (nairatmya) as self-being, and “dominion of subjectivity” for replacing a metaphysical postulation; and the transcendentals as wisdom and compassion.
Mathew Varghese
Mathew Varghese is a scholar who works on classical philosophy, mainly, on the works of Nagarjuna, the second century Middle Path (Madhyamika) Buddhist philosopher. He shows keen interest in then discussing contemporary philosophical issues and interpreting them in classical philosophical framework. He has published two text-based interpretational works on Madhyamika philosophy: Principles of Buddhist Tantra (2008) and Exploring the Structure of Emptiness (2012); and also, several papers on Buddhist and comparative philosophy. He is a research fellow at The Nakamura Hajime Eastern Institute, Tokyo; and also teaches at Aoyama Gakuin University, Kanagawa University and Wako University, in and around Tokyo, offering courses on classical philosophy from a comparative perspective. As a researcher, he is keenly interested in researching the classical conception of Negation and its application possibilities.
Editorial Reviews
“The transcendentalism implies the unity of self-being (soul) with qua being (God) which is the foundation of Aristotelian metaphysics. And the empirical experience of it as truth and goodness discerned rationally from the phenomenal experiences. According to Aristotle: If no universal can be a substance, as has been said in our discussion of substance and being, and if being itself cannot be a substance in the sense of one apart from many, but is only a predicate, clearly unity cannot be a substance; for being and unity are the most universal of all predicates. The universal never could be a substance discernible to humans. It is beyond human cognition, but being and unity are the universal. The soul’s unity with the heavens is unique unity. But in modern times we are trying to create universal as a substance. Vedic philosophy in India follows a similar view as they accept the teachings of the Vedas as the absolute truth and the intrinsic and organic relationship between atman (soul) and Brahman is the paradigm for explaining transcendentalism where, when the misconceptions and confusions created by illusions (maya) are removed, all transcendental virtues would be dawned in the subjective self organically. So the efforts of the individual should be to realize the self-nature of the atman (soul). Vedic philosophy, instead of relying on a transcendental entity such as heaven and the empire of the gods, relay upon the teachings of the Vedas as the metaphysical sources of knowledge. Accordingly, the transcendental virtues in Vedic philosophy are Truth, Concsciousness, and Bliss (sat, cit, and ananda). In short, Vedic philosophy focuses on the inherent subjective virtuous self-nature of atman (soul) and its natural relationship with eternity (Brahman), where the true nature of Brahman is inexplicable, but the relationship of atman (soul) with Brahman is discernible as transcendental virtues: Truth, Consciousness, and Bliss (sat, cit, and ananda). The book tries to explain the unique conception of Buddhist subjective self (self-being) to explain what is meant by the conception of nairatmya—essenceless atman, by using the conceptions of ‘self-being’ and ‘dominion of subjectivity’. The Buddhist understanding of transcendentalism is not based on positively asserting and logically concluding any trans-empirical entity that is independent of the phenomenal world of existence. Buddha, and later, Nagarjuna, use negations to explain the Buddhist conception of transcendentalism, which can be discerned in the dominion of subjectivity as the self-being of an individual.”
—Prabuddha Bharata, February 2021