The ''Tattvasiddhi-Śāstra'' ("The Treatise that Accomplishes Reality"; , also reconstructed as ''Satyasiddhi-Śāstra''), is an Indian

Abhidharma The Abhidharma are ancient (third century BCE and later) Buddhist texts which contain detailed scholastic presentations of doctrinal material appearing in the Buddhist ''sutras''. It also refers to the scholastic method itself as well as the f ...

Buddhist text by a figure known as

Harivarman Hari-varman ( Gupta script: ''Ha-ri-va-rmmā'') was the founder of the Maukhari dynasty. He is the first ruler to be named in the known Maukhari records. Biography Hari-varman was the founder of the Maukhari dynasty. He is the first ruler to b ...

(250-350). It was translated into Chinese in 411 by

Kumārajīva Kumārajīva (Sanskrit: कुमारजीव; , 344–413 CE) was a Buddhist monk, scholar, missionary and translator from the Kingdom of Kucha (present-day Aksu Prefecture, Xinjiang, China). Kumārajīva is seen as one of the greatest ...

and this translation (Taishō number: T1646) is the only extant version, which became popular in China. This text was translated into English by N. Aiyaswami Sastri in 1978.

Author and school affiliation

What little information exists about Harivarman is from Chinese sources which put him sometime between 250-350 CE. According to Xuanzang's biography, Harivarman was born a Brahmin, ordained with the

Sarvāstivāda The ''Sarvāstivāda'' (Sanskrit and Pali: 𑀲𑀩𑁆𑀩𑀢𑁆𑀣𑀺𑀯𑀸𑀤, ) was one of the early Buddhist schools established around the reign of Ashoka (3rd century BCE).Westerhoff, The Golden Age of Indian Buddhist Philosophy ...

, and became a student of the Sarvāstivāda teacher

Kumāralāta Kumāralāta (3rd century) was an Indian founder of the Sautrāntika school of Buddhism. He was a native of Taxila, in modern day Pakistan. Biography According to the Chinese sources, he moved to Kabandha, where the king of the country gave hi ...

(possibly the same as the original teacher of Sautrantika) who taught him the "great Abhidharma of Kātyāyana (迦旃延) with thousands of gāthās" probably the

Jnanaprasthana Jñānaprasthāna ( sa, ज्ञानप्रस्थान) or Jñānaprasthāna-śāstra (), composed originally in Sanskrit by Kātyāyanīputra, is one of the seven Sarvastivada Abhidharma Buddhist scriptures. Jñānaprasthāna means "est ...

. However Harivarman was unhappy with the Abhidharma teachings and spent years studying the sutras to find the source of the disputes of the different

schools and after engaged in many debates with various Abhidharma teachers, becoming unpopular among them. Xuanchang says he later took up living among the Mahāsāṅghikas and wrote the Tattvasiddhi while living in

Pataliputra Pataliputra (IAST: ), adjacent to modern-day Patna, was a city in ancient India, originally built by Magadha ruler Ajatashatru in 490 BCE as a small fort () near the Ganges river.. Udayin laid the foundation of the city of Pataliputra at the ...

. The goal of this work was to “eliminate confusion and abandon the later developments, with the hope of returning to the origin” The school affiliation of the author and his text has been debated for hundreds of years, even the early Chinese sources disagree. Jizang (吉藏 549-623 CE) states that various Chinese teachers consider him as being either a Dharmaguptaka, a Sautrantika, a Dārṣṭāntika, an eclectic teacher, a

Bahuśrutīya Bahuśrutīya (Sanskrit) was one of the early Buddhist schools, according to early sources such as Vasumitra, the ''Śāriputraparipṛcchā'', and other sources, and was a sub-group which emerged from the Mahāsāṃghika sect. Etymology The nam ...

or a Mahayanist. Three monks,

Zhiyi Zhiyi (; 538–597 CE) also Chen De'an (陳德安), is the fourth patriarch of the Tiantai tradition of Buddhism in China. His standard title was Śramaṇa Zhiyi (沙門智顗), linking him to the broad tradition of Indian asceticism. Zhiyi i ...

(531-597),

Jizang Jizang (. Japanese: ) (549–623) was a Persian-Chinese Buddhist monk and scholar who is often regarded as the founder of East Asian Mādhyamaka. He is also known as Jiaxiang or Master Jiaxiang () because he acquired fame at the Jiaxiang Temple. ...

(549-623) and Jingying, labeled it a

Hinayana Hīnayāna (, ) is a Sanskrit term literally meaning the "small/deficient vehicle". Classical Chinese and Tibetan teachers translate it as "smaller vehicle". The term is applied collectively to the ''Śrāvakayāna'' and ''Pratyekabuddhayāna'' pa ...

school; it was

Daoxuan Daoxuan (; 596–667) was an eminent Tang dynasty Chinese Buddhist monk. He is perhaps best known as the patriarch of the Four-part Vinaya school (). Daoxuan wrote both the ''Continued Biographies of Eminent Monks'' (Xù gāosēng zhuàn 續高 ...

(596-667) who first identified it as Sautrāntika. The Japanese scholars Katsura Shōryu and Fukuhara Ryōgon, in analyzing the doctrinal content, maintain that Harivarman is closest to the

school. This is also the position of A.K. Warder. Kumārajīva's student Sengrui discovered Harivarman had refused the

abhidharma The Abhidharma are ancient (third century BCE and later) Buddhist texts which contain detailed scholastic presentations of doctrinal material appearing in the Buddhist ''sutras''. It also refers to the scholastic method itself as well as the f ...

schools' approach to Buddhist seven times in the text, suggesting a strong sectarian division between them and the Sautrāntikas. Qian Lin notes the difficulty of using doctrinal analysis to pin down a specific school affiliation due to the fluidity of said schools and the terms used to refer to them. He cautiously places him among the Dārṣṭāntika-

Sautrāntika The Sautrāntika or Sutravadin ( sa, सौत्रान्तिक, Suttavāda in Pali; ; ja, 経量部, Kyou Ryou Bu) were an early Buddhist school generally believed to be descended from the Sthavira nikāya by way of their immediate pare ...

Content

The Tattvasiddhi is preserved in sixteen fascicles in the Chinese with 202 chapters, it is organized according to the four noble truths. I. Introduction (發聚) (chapters 1-35) # The three treasures of Buddhism (三寶) (1-12) # Introduction to the treatise and its content (13-18) # Ten points of controversy (19-35) II. The truth of suffering (苦諦聚) (36-94) # Form (rūpa 色) (36-59) # Consciousness (vijñāna 識) (60-76) # Apperception (saṃjñā 想) (77) # Feeling (vedanā 受) (78-83) # Volitional formations (saṃskāra 行) (84-94) III. The truth of origin (集諦聚) (95-140) # Karma (業) (95-120) # Defilements (煩惱 kleśa) (121-140) IV. The truth of cessation (滅諦聚) (141-154) V. The truth of the path (道諦聚) (155-202) # Concentration (定 samādhi) (155-188) # Insight (慧 prajñā) (189-202) In the text Harivarman attacks the

Sarvastivada The ''Sarvāstivāda'' (Sanskrit and Pali: 𑀲𑀩𑁆𑀩𑀢𑁆𑀣𑀺𑀯𑀸𑀤, ) was one of the early Buddhist schools established around the reign of Ashoka (3rd century BCE).Westerhoff, The Golden Age of Indian Buddhist Philosophy ...

school's doctrine of "all exists" and the Pudgalavada theory of person. The ''Tattvasiddhi'' includes the teaching of ''

dharma Dharma (; sa, धर्म, dharma, ; pi, dhamma, italic=yes) is a key concept with multiple meanings in Indian religions, such as Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Sikhism and others. Although there is no direct single-word translation for '' ...

śūnyatā ''Śūnyatā'' ( sa, शून्यता, śūnyatā; pi, suññatā; ), translated most often as ''emptiness'', ''vacuity'', and sometimes ''voidness'', is an Indian philosophical concept. Within Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism and other p ...

'', the emptiness of phenomena. This text also mentions the existence of a ''

Bodhisattva In Buddhism, a bodhisattva ( ; sa, 𑀩𑁄𑀥𑀺𑀲𑀢𑁆𑀢𑁆𑀯 (Brahmī), translit=bodhisattva, label=Sanskrit) or bodhisatva is a person who is on the path towards bodhi ('awakening') or Buddhahood. In the Early Buddhist schools ...

Piṭaka''. A central teaching of the text is that dharmas have no substance or substratum, they appear real but they are "like bubbles or like a circle of fire seen when a rope torch is whirled around very quickly." Harivarman writes: "All parts being analyzed again and again are reduced to atoms which again being broken become non-existent. All things culminate necessarily in the idea of Shunyata." Another important argument covered in the text is on the relationship between mind or consciousness (

citta ''Citta'' (Pali and Sanskrit: चित्त; pronounced ''chitta''; IAST: ''citta)'' is one of three overlapping terms used in the '' nikaya'' to refer to the mind, the others being '' manas'' and '' viññāṇa''. Each is sometimes used in ...

) and

mental factors Mental factors ( sa, चैतसिक, caitasika or ''chitta samskara'' ; pi, cetasika; Tibetan: སེམས་བྱུང ''sems byung''), in Buddhism, are identified within the teachings of the Abhidhamma (Buddhist psychology). They are d ...

(caitasikas). Harivarman argues against the common Abhidharma idea of "association" (''samprayoga'') which held that caitasikas and citta were separate elemental constituents of experience which "associate" or join together. Instead, according to Lin, his view is that "“mental factors” are not actually things different from consciousness but are in their nature precisely consciousness manifested in different modes". The Tattvasiddhi outlines a conception of the

two truths doctrine The Buddhist doctrine of the two truths (Sanskrit: ''dvasatya,'' ) differentiates between two levels of ''satya'' (Sanskrit; Pali: ''sacca''; word meaning "truth" or "reality") in the teaching of the Śākyamuni Buddha: the "conventional" or "pr ...

, explaining conventional or nominal truth and ultimate truth. The Tattvasiddhi also outlines the importance of a

samadhi ''Samadhi'' (Pali and sa, समाधि), in Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism and yogic schools, is a state of meditative consciousness. In Buddhism, it is the last of the eight elements of the Noble Eightfold Path. In the Ashtanga Yoga ...

which is a "cause of knowledge of things as they are, which is the same as knowledge of Shunyata."

Chinese sect

The Tattvasiddhi school () was a sect based on the ''Tattvasiddhi'' which was influential but short-lived in India and had a brief continuation in China and the

Asuka Asuka may refer to: People * Asuka (name), a list of people * Asuka (wrestler), professional wrestler * Asuka (wrestler, born 1998), professional wrestler also known as Veny outside of Japan Places In Japan * , an area in Yamato Province (now ...

and

Nara period The of the history of Japan covers the years from CE 710 to 794. Empress Genmei established the capital of Heijō-kyō (present-day Nara). Except for a five-year period (740–745), when the capital was briefly moved again, it remained the cap ...

s of Japan. The Tattvasiddhi was initially promoted by three of Kumarajiva's students, Sengrui (僧叡 or 僧睿, ca. 4th-5th c. CE), Sengdao (僧導 362-457 CE) and Sengsong (僧嵩 date unknown). Sengdao wrote a commentary on the text and his lineage was centered in Shouchun while the lineage of Sengson was centered in Pengcheng. Other major expounders of the Tattvasiddhi in

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

include the group named "Three Great Masters of the

Liang dynasty The Liang dynasty (), alternatively known as the Southern Liang () in historiography, was an imperial dynasty of China and the third of the four Southern dynasties during the Northern and Southern dynasties period. It was preceded by the South ...

": Sengmin (僧旻, 467–527), Zhizang (智蔵) (458–522) and Fayun (法雲, 467–529), who initially interpreted the sect as

Mahayana ''Mahāyāna'' (; "Great Vehicle") is a term for a broad group of Buddhist traditions, texts, philosophies, and practices. Mahāyāna Buddhism developed in India (c. 1st century BCE onwards) and is considered one of the three main existing bra ...

in outlook. The three of them in turn received instructions in this treatise from the monk Huici (慧次, 434–490). The three of them also possibly influenced the writing of the ''

Sangyō Gisho The is the title of three annotated commentaries on important Buddhist sutras: , , and . ''Hokke Gisho'' An annotated commentary on the ''Lotus Sutra''; four volumes in length. It is based on the annotated text ''Fa Hua Yi Ji'' (法華義記) b ...

'', a sutra commentary supposedly authored by

Prince Shōtoku , also known as or , was a semi-legendary regent and a politician of the Asuka period in Japan who served under Empress Suiko. He was the son of Emperor Yōmei and his consort, Princess Anahobe no Hashihito, who was also Yōmei's younger half-s ...

. The tradition of the Tattvasiddhi remained strong up until the

Tang Dynasty The Tang dynasty (, ; zh, t= ), or Tang Empire, was an Dynasties in Chinese history, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 618 to 907 AD, with an Zhou dynasty (690–705), interregnum between 690 and 705. It was preceded by the Sui dyn ...

, up to 24 commentaries were written on the text, all of which are now lost. The Madhyamaka teacher

(549–623) strongly criticized the work as "Hinayana" (lesser vehicle) and possibly due to the rise of new more influential schools such as the Huayan and Tiantai schools, the Chinese tradition of the Tattvasiddhi died out.Lin, pg 31

Japan

It was introduced to Japan as Jōjitsu in 625 by the

monk A monk (, from el, μοναχός, ''monachos'', "single, solitary" via Latin ) is a person who practices religious asceticism by monastic living, either alone or with any number of other monks. A monk may be a person who decides to dedica ...

Ekwan of

Goryeo Goryeo (; ) was a Korean kingdom founded in 918, during a time of national division called the Later Three Kingdoms period, that unified and ruled the Korean Peninsula until 1392. Goryeo achieved what has been called a "true national unificati ...

. In Japan, it was classified as one of the three approaches of

East Asian Mādhyamaka East Asian Madhyamaka refers to the Buddhist tradition in East Asia which represents the Indian Madhyamaka (''Chung-kuan'') system of thought. In Chinese Buddhism, these are often referred to as the ''Sānlùn'' ( Ch. 三論宗, Jp. ''Sanron'', ...

instead of a separate lineage. was one of the .

References

Bibliography