Mūlamadhyamakakārikā (मूलमध्यमककारिका)

Executive summary

The Mūlamadhyamakakārikā (मूलमध्यमककारिका) is a nāstika (नास्तिक) book. The Veda is not its means of knowing. Nāgārjuna (नागार्जुन)'s verses take the middle between it is and it is not. Emptiness is the absence of a nature a thing would have on its own. The same point is said, in chapter 24, as dependent arising and as the middle path. Twenty-seven chapters, and an opening homage the commentaries recite first, each undo one cluster of things people take to exist by themselves.

नेपालीमा

मूलमध्यमककारिका नास्तिक पुस्तक हो। वेद यसको प्रमाण होइन। नागार्जुनका श्लोकले छ भन्ने र छैन भन्ने दुईको बीचको बाटो लिन्छन्। शून्यता भनेको कुनै कुराले आफैंमा राख्ने स्वभावको अभाव हो। अध्याय २४ मा त्यही कुरा प्रतीत्यसमुत्पाद र मध्यमार्ग पनि भनिन्छ। टीकाहरूले पहिले सुनाउने मङ्गलाचरण र सत्ताइस अध्यायले मानिसले आफैंमा छ भनी ठान्ने कुराको एक-एक थुप्रो फुकाउँछन्।

This is a nāstika (नास्तिक) book. The Veda is not its pramāṇa (प्रमाण). The author is Nāgārjuna (नागार्जुन). The verses are the Mūlamadhyamakakārikā (मूलमध्यमककारिका), the root verses of the middle way. The companion the tradition reads beside them is Candrakīrti (चन्द्रकीर्ति)'s Prasannapadā (प्रसन्नपदा). The sitting stays with the verse.

Madhyamaka (मध्यमक) means the middle. The middle is between "it is" and "it is not." Śūnyatā (शून्यता), emptiness, is the name for the absence of svabhāva (स्वभाव), a nature a thing would have on its own. Chapter 24, verse 18, says the same thing three ways: pratītyasamutpāda (प्रतीत्यसमुत्पाद), dependent arising, śūnyatā (शून्यता), and the madhyamā pratipat (मध्यमा प्रतिपत्), the middle path.

The electronic text has 448 verses in twenty-seven chapters. The opening homage is not in that file. It is taught here as the line the commentaries recite first, and the sitting says so. A few compounds in chapter 1 are written without spaces. The sitting separates them.

Chapter 1 is the method. Chapter 25 is nirvāṇa (निर्वाण). The opening, chapter 1, verse 24.18, and chapter 25 are written out by hand. Every other verse is in the pāṭha (पाठ) and has a gloss of its words.

The other Buddhist book here is Vasubandhu's Viṃśatikā (विंशतिका). Śaṅkara's verse on this negation is Upadeśasāhasrī (उपदेशसाहस्री) 3.3.

449 of 449 lines are written out word by word.

The word-by-word glosses on the part pages were generated automatically and have not all been reviewed.

भाग-पृष्ठका शब्दार्थ स्वचालित रूपमा बनाइएका हुन्, र सबै जाँचिएका छैनन्।

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Chapters