Mabja Jangchub Tsöndrü (Tib. རྨ་བྱ་བྱང་ཆུབ་བརྩོན་འགྲུས་, Wyl. ''rma bya byang chub brtson 'grus,'' d. 1185) was an influential 12th century Tibetan Buddhist

Madhyamaka Madhyamaka ("middle way" or "centrism"; ; ; Tibetic languages, Tibetan: དབུ་མ་པ་ ; ''dbu ma pa''), otherwise known as Śūnyavāda ("the Śūnyatā, emptiness doctrine") and Niḥsvabhāvavāda ("the no Svabhava, ''svabhāva'' d ...

scholar.''Reason and Experience in Tibetan Buddhism: Mabja Jangchub Tsöndrü and the Traditions of the Middle Way'' Reviewed by Adam C. Krug
Journal of Buddhist Ethics ISSN 1076-9005 http://blogs.dickinson.edu/buddhistethics Volume 22, 2015 Doctor 2014, p. 1. He is known for his "''Ornament of Reason"'', an important commentary on Nagarjuna's ''

Mūlamadhyamakakārikā The ''Mūlamadhyamakakārikā'' (), abbreviated as ''MMK'', is the foundational text of the Madhyamaka school of Mahāyāna Buddhist philosophy. It was composed by the Indian philosopher Nāgārjuna (around roughly 150 CE).Siderits and Katsura ...

''.

Overview

Mabja was a disciple of

Kadampa file:Portrait of the Indian Monk Atisha.jpg, 300px, Tibetan Portrait of Atiśa The Kadam school () of Tibetan Buddhism, or Kadampa was an 11th century Buddhist tradition founded by the great Bengalis, Bengali master Atiśa (982–1054) and his ...

scholars of Sangphu monastery such as Patsab Nyima Drak and Chapa Chökyi Seng-ge (1109-1169) as well as of the Indian Madhyamaka Jayānanda. Unlike Chapa, Mabja followed Patsab in embracing the philosophy of

Candrakirti Chandrakirti (; Sanskrit: चंद्रकीर्ति; ; , meaning "glory of the moon" in Sanskrit) or "Chandra" was a Buddhist scholar of the Madhyamaka school who was based out of the monastery of Nalanda. He was a noted commentator o ...

, but he also embraced the close study of Buddhist epistemology of

pramāṇa ''Pramana'' (; IAST: Pramāṇa) literally means "proof" and "means of knowledge".

(epistemic warrants, reliable means of cognition), which he saw as achievable and necessary. According to Adam C. Krug:

"Mabja attempts to salvage Buddhist pramāṇa from the kind of categorical rejection leveled by Jayānanda and Patsab by maintaining a radical
fallibilism Originally, fallibilism (from Medieval Latin: ''fallibilis'', "liable to error") is the philosophical principle that propositions can be accepted even though they cannot be conclusively proven or justified,Haack, Susan (1979)"Fallibilism and Nece ...
with respect to the status of appearances. He rejects all notions that pramāṇas are related to their objects “by the force of fact” (Skt. vastubalapravṛtti, Tib. dngos po’i stobs zhugs), yet allows for a correct understanding of pramāṇas as relative truth (Skt. saṃvṛtisatya, Tib. kun rdzob bden pa) in light of their basis in a pre-analytic experience of dependent origination."

Mabja also maintained a radical

agnosticism Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, the divine, or the supernatural is either unknowable in principle or unknown in fact. (page 56 in 1967 edition) It can also mean an apathy towards such religious belief and refer t ...

regarding the nature and status of

Buddhahood In Buddhism, Buddha (, which in classic Indo-Aryan languages, Indic languages means "awakened one") is a title for those who are Enlightenment in Buddhism, spiritually awake or enlightened, and have thus attained the Buddhist paths to liberat ...

Works

Mabja wrote the following works: * ''The Ornament of Reason,'' a commentary on Nagarjuna's ''

.'' * ''The Appearance of Reality, Ornament to the Six Collections of Middle Way Reasoning.'' A series of root verses and a commentary on Madhyamaka reasoning. The work follows Jayānanda’s ''Logic Hammer'' (Skt. ''Tarkamudgara'') in some respects. * A Commentary on Candrakirti's ''Clear Words'' (Skt. '' Prasannapadā'')

Influence

Mabja's Madhyamaka scholarship was very influential on later Tibetan Madhyamikas like

Longchenpa Longchen Rabjam Drimé Özer (), or simply Longchenpa (1308–1364, "The Great One Who Is the Vast Cosmic Expanse") was a Tibetan scholar-yogi of the Nyingma school, the 'Old School' of Tibetan Buddhism. According to tibetologist David German ...

Tsongkhapa Tsongkhapa ( Tibetan: ཙོང་ཁ་པ་, '','' meaning: "the man from Tsongkha" or "the Man from Onion Valley", c. 1357–1419) was an influential Tibetan Buddhist monk, philosopher and tantric yogi, whose activities led to the format ...

Gorampa Gorampa Sonam Senge (, 1429–1489Dreyfus (2003) p.301) was an important philosopher in the Sakya school of Tibetan Buddhism. He was the author of a vast collection of commentaries on sutra and tantra whose work was influential throughout Tibetan ...

, and Mikyö Dorje. All these figures read Mabja and responded to him in different ways, often drawing on his insights. In his ''Light Rays of the Authentic View'', Gorampa even reproduces passages directly taken from Mabja’s ''Ornament of Reason'' (without mentioning his source). Similarly, according to Thomas Doctor, Tsongkhapa’s famous critique of svātantrika madhyamaka is mostly a restatement of Mabja's critique (something which Śākya Chokden had pointed out in his critique of Tsongkhapa). Doctor also notes that "Mikyö Dorje declares Mabja to be the central Tibetan authority behind his presentation of the two truths."Doctor 2014, p. 4.

References

Sources

*Doctor, Thomas (2014). ''Reason and Experience in Tibetan Buddhism: Mabja Jangchub Tsöndrü and the Traditions of the Middle Way.'' Routledge. *Mabja Jangchub Tsöndrü (2011), ''Ornament of Reason: The Great Commentary to Nagarjuna's Root of the Middle Way'', Translated by the Dharmachakra Translation Committee. Ithaca: Snow Lion. *Kevin A. Vose (2009) ''Resurrecting Candrakirti: Disputes in the Tibetan Creation of Prasangika'', Boston: Wisdom Publications. {{DEFAULTSORT:Patsab Nyima Drakpa Scholars of Buddhism from Tibet Lamas Madhyamaka Tibetan philosophers