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Nâgârjuna on Buddhism


 

"For all of eternity, everything is unexpressible, ineffable, at rest and pure."
Nâgârjuna : Treatise on the Middle, Seuil - Paris, 1995, p.244.

 

"If, for all eternity, all is at rest, then effectively Buddha has said nothing, or at least his speech is an empty speech, a speech without speech, a silent saying, a discourse without contents. The language of the Buddha is the language of Awakening, of which the unique grammar is silence, of which the absence of formulation is its only expression. The language of the Buddha is the language which by itself never said something, which never made itself heard and which was never perceived. Empty of significance, it was never preached, never preached, it was never understood, never understood, it thus was never transmitted. The un-saying of emptiness can not be the object of any positive translation, to utter emptiness is to say nothing, which is why the Buddha could not have expressed himself. The discourse of emptiness is the emptiness of every discourse. The teaching of vacuity is the vacuity of every teaching. Since always silence reigns and was never troubled. For all of eternity, everything is at rest."
Vivenza, J.M. : Nâgârjuna et la doctrine de la vacuité, Albin Michel - Paris, 2001, p.111, my translation & italics.

 

          

©  Wim van den Dungen
Antwerp, 2000 - 2008.