Philosophical Investigation of Sunyata in the Madhyamika Philosophy

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The theme of this research project is to establish the solid foundation for the philosophical investigation of the "emptiness" theory from the logical point of view. So far the "emptiness" thought of Madhyamika philosophy has been considered to transcend language description and to be grasped only intuitively. But Tsong kha pa, the last master of the lineage of Madhyamika philosophers and the founder of Gelug sect, analyzes the emptiness from the logical point of view, and established the logical, interpretation of Madhyamika philosophy. From that reason we dealt with his thought chiefly in the research project of this year. We also prepared a critical edition and Japanese translation of his small treatise as a solid foundation of further philosophical investigation of his Madhyamika thought. The framework of his Madhyamika philosophy is expressed by the so-called "Remarkable characteristics surpassing other philosophical standpoints (thun mong ma yin pa'i khyad chos) ". He counts eight characteristics and emphasizes that all these characteristics should be reduced to one principle that Prasangika philosophy does not allow the substantial basis of the object of worldly language activities. The treatise of which we prepared the critical text and the translation is "A Lecture on the eight difficult and important points in Madhyamika theory (dka' gnas brgyad kyi zin bris) ". These difficult and important points are almost same as eight remarkable characteristics surpassing other philosophical standpoints. In this text Tsong kha pa summarizes his Madhyamika philosophy briefly and comprehensively. Following descriptions of this text we can easily understand the basic points of his philosophy. We also added some lists on the same theme presented by later masters of Gelug sect, that is, 'Jams dbyangs bzhed pa, 1Cang skya and Glong rdol bla ma.