Defilement, the Three Marks, and the Agent
Examining Defilement and the Defiled — Examining Act and Agent觀染染者品第六 — 觀作作者品第八
Three chapters, one argument, run three times over. An attribute and the thing that bears it, an act and the one who performs it: Nāgārjuna shows that no such pair can be established as identical, and none as separate — and so none can be established at all. At the center stands the longest chapter in the whole treatise, thirty-five verses against arising, abiding, and ceasing, the three marks by which the Abhidharma defined a conditioned thing. It contains the treatise's most notorious infinite regress, an arising that needs its own arising, and its most beautiful failed simile: the lamp that is supposed to light itself.
The Text
Chapter 6 · Examining Defilement and the Defiled 觀染染者品第六
The opponent begins from the most practical ground in Buddhism: greed, hatred, and delusion, the three poisons that drive the whole machine of birth and death. Surely, he says, if there is a defilement there is someone defiled by it — and there is your world, your karma, your realms of rebirth, your everything. Nāgārjuna does not deny that people are defiled. He asks which of the two, the defilement or the defiled person, is supposed to arrive first; and finding no answer, he asks whether they might arrive together; and finding no answer to that, he asks whether the two are one thing or two.
問曰：經說貪欲、瞋恚、愚癡是世間根本。貪欲有種種名，初名愛、次名著、次名染、次名婬欲、次名貪欲，有如是等名字。此是結使，依止眾生眾生名染者，貪欲名染法。有染法、染者故，則有貪欲。餘二亦如是，有瞋則有瞋者、有癡則有癡者。以此三毒因緣起三業，三業因緣起三界，是故有一切法。
答曰：經雖說有三毒名字，求實不可得。何以故？
Question: The sūtras say that craving, hatred, and delusion are the root of the world. Craving goes by many names: first it is called love, then attachment, then defilement, then lust, then craving — it has names of this kind. It is a fetter, and it rests upon sentient beings. The sentient being is called the one defiled, and craving is called the defilement. Because there is a defilement and one defiled by it, there is craving. The other two poisons are the same: where there is hatred there is one who hates, where there is delusion there is one who is deluded. From these three poisons as causal conditions the three kinds of action arise; from the three kinds of action as causal conditions the three realms arise. And therefore all things exist.
Answer: Although the sūtras give the names of the three poisons, when you look for them as real things they cannot be found. Why?
若離於染法， 先自有染者，
因是染欲者， 應生於染法；
若無有染者， 云何當有染？
若有若無染， 染者亦如是。
If apart from the defilement
the defiled one were already there on his own,
then on the strength of that craving, defiled one
the defilement would have to arise.
And if there were no defiled one,
how could there be any defilement?
Whether the defilement exists or not,
it is just the same for the defiled one.
若先定有染者，則不更須染，染者先已染故。若先定無染者，亦復不應起染，要當先有染者然後起染。若先無染者，則無受染者。染法亦如是，若先離人定有染法，此則無因，云何得起？似如無薪火。若先定無染法則無有染者，是故偈中說「若有若無染，染者亦如是。」
If a defiled one definitely exists beforehand, he has no further need of the defilement, since the defiled one is already defiled. And if a defiled one definitely does not exist beforehand, no defilement can arise either, for there must first be someone defiled and only then does the defilement arise; and if there is no defiled one beforehand, there is nobody to take the defilement on. It is the same with the defilement. If a defilement definitely exists beforehand, apart from any person, then it has no cause — how could it ever arise? It would be like a fire with no firewood. And if the defilement definitely does not exist beforehand, then there is no defiled one. This is why the verse says: "Whether the defilement exists or not, it is just the same for the defiled one."
Start with what the chapter is not doing. It is not saying that nobody is greedy. Piṅgala accepts the opponent's whole psychology — the fetters, the poisons, the karma, the realms — and asks only one question about it: in what order do the two halves arrive?
Try to answer it honestly and you will feel the floor move. Suppose the person is there first, fully himself, and then greed shows up in him. But then what makes him "a greedy person"? Not the greed, since he was already complete without it. Suppose instead the greed is there first, floating, and then finds someone to land on. Piṅgala's image for that is exact and slightly comic: 似如無薪火 — a fire with no firewood. A fire has to be a fire of something. Anger with nobody angry is not a leftover; it is nothing.
Notice what this does to a habit of speech we all have. We talk as though our afflictions were substances that visited us — anger came over me, the craving took hold — and simultaneously as though we were a standing self that the visits happen to. The two pictures cannot both be right, and the chapter is showing that neither is right on its own. The defilement has no footing without the person, and the person has no defilement-bearing character without the defilement. They are two names cut out of one process, not two items that met.
問曰：若染法、染者先後相待生，是事不可得者。若一時生，有何咎？答曰：
Question: Suppose it cannot be established that the defilement and the defiled one arise in dependence on each other, one before and one after. What then is wrong with their arising at the very same time? Answer:
染者及染法， 俱成則不然；
染者染法俱， 則無有相待。
That the defiled one and the defilement
are established together will not do:
if the defiled one and the defilement are together,
then there is no depending on each other.
若染法、染者一時成，則不相待，不因染者有染法。不因染法有染者，是二應常，已無因成故。若常則多過，無有解脫法。復次今當以一異法破染法、染者。何以故？
If the defilement and the defiled one are established at the very same time, then they do not depend on each other: the defilement is not there because of the defiled one, and the defiled one is not there because of the defilement. In that case the two would have to be permanent, since they would have been established with no cause at all. And if they were permanent, many faults follow — there would be no liberation. Furthermore, we shall now break the defilement and the defiled one by way of identity and difference. Why?
染者染法一， 一法云何合？
染者染法異， 異法云何合？
If the defiled one and the defilement are one,
how can a single thing be joined?
If the defiled one and the defilement are different,
how can two different things be joined?
染法、染者，若以一法合、若以異法合。若一則無合。何以故？一法云何自合？如指端不能自觸。若以異法合，是亦不可。何以故？以異成故。若各成竟，不須復合，雖合猶異。復次一異俱不可。何以故？
The defilement and the defiled one are joined either as one thing or as two different things. If they are one, there is no joining. Why? How could a single thing join with itself? A fingertip cannot touch itself. If they are joined as different things, that will not do either. Why? Because each is established as different, and if each is fully established on its own there is no need for any further joining — and even joined, they remain different. Furthermore, neither identity nor difference will do. Why?
若一有合者， 離伴應有合；
若異有合者， 離伴亦應合。
If what is one can be joined,
it should be joined without a partner;
and if what is different can be joined,
it too should be joined without a partner.
若染、染者一，強名為合者，應離餘因緣而有染、染者。復次若一，亦不應有染、染者二名，染是法、染者是人。若人法為一，是則大亂。若染、染者各異而言合者，則不須餘因緣而有合。若異而合者，雖遠亦應合。
問曰：一不合，可爾；眼見異法共合。答曰：
If the defilement and the defiled one are one, and you insist on calling that a joining, then there would be a defilement and a defiled one quite apart from any other conditions. Furthermore, if they are one there ought not to be two names, "defilement" and "the defiled one" — the defilement is an attribute and the defiled one is a person. If person and attribute are one thing, everything falls into confusion. And if the defilement and the defiled one are each different and you still call them joined, then their joining needs no other conditions at all; and if things that are different can be joined, they ought to be joined however far apart they stand.
Question: That what is one cannot be joined — very well. But we see with our own eyes that different things are joined together. Answer:
若異而有合， 染染者何事？
是二相先異， 然後說合相。
If different things are joined,
what has that to do with defilement and the defiled?
These two are marked as different first,
and only afterward is joining spoken of.
若染、染者先有決定異相而後合者，是則不合。何以故？是二相先已異，而後強說合。復次：
If the defilement and the defiled one carry fixed marks of difference first and are joined only afterward, then they are not joined at all. Why? Because the two are already different beforehand, and the joining is merely forced onto them after the fact. Furthermore:
若染及染者， 先各成異相，
既已成異相， 云何而言合？
If the defilement and the defiled one
are each established beforehand as different,
and their difference is already established,
how can you speak of joining at all?
若染、染者先各成別相，汝今何以強說合相？復次：
If the defilement and the defiled one are each already established with separate marks, why do you now force the mark of joining upon them? Furthermore:
異相無有成， 是故汝欲合；
合相竟無成， 而復說異相。
The mark of difference is not established,
and so you want them joined;
the mark of joining is not established in the end,
and so you speak of difference again.
汝已染、染者異相不成故，復說合相。合相中有過，染、染者不成。汝為成合相故，復說異相。汝自已為定，而所說不定。何以故？
Since for you the mark of difference between the defilement and the defiled one is not established, you fall back on the mark of joining. But there are faults inside the mark of joining, and the defilement and the defiled one are not established there either. So in order to make the mark of joining work, you fall back again on the mark of difference. You take yourself to have settled the matter; what you say settles nothing. Why?
異相不成故， 合相則不成；
於何異相中， 而欲說合相？
Because the mark of difference is not established,
the mark of joining is not established;
within what difference, then,
do you wish to speak of joining?
以此中染、染者異相不成故，合相亦不成。汝於何異相中而欲說合相？復次：
Since here the mark of difference between the defilement and the defiled one is not established, neither is the mark of joining. Within what difference do you wish to speak of joining? Furthermore:
如是染染者， 非合不合成；
諸法亦如是， 非合不合成。
Thus the defilement and the defiled one
are established neither as joined nor as unjoined;
and all things are the same:
established neither as joined nor as unjoined.
如染，恚癡亦如是。如三毒，一切煩惱、一切法亦如是。非先非後、非合非散等，因緣所成。
As with defilement, so with hatred and delusion. As with the three poisons, so with all the afflictions and with all things whatsoever. Not before, not after, not joined, not scattered — they are made by causes and conditions.
The second half of the chapter changes weapons. Having failed to get the two halves into any workable order, the opponent proposes that they simply come together — 合, joined, combined, coinciding — and the argument now turns on that word.
The dilemma is put with a single household image: 如指端不能自觸, a fingertip cannot touch itself. Touching takes two. So if the defilement and the defiled person are one thing, there is nothing there to be joined to anything; and if they are genuinely two, each already fully itself before the meeting, then joining adds nothing — even joined, they remain different, and you have two complete strangers standing next to each other, not a defiled person. Piṅgala puts his finger on why the second horn is so tempting and so useless: 染是法、染者是人 — the defilement is an attribute, the defiled one is a person. We do want them to be two, because they belong to different categories. And that is exactly why they cannot be joined into one fact.
Then verse 8 catches the opponent in the act. Difference fails, so he reaches for joining; joining fails, so he reaches back for difference. Each half of his position is being propped up by the half he has just abandoned. This oscillation — arguing from A when B is under attack, and from B when A is — is the most common way a philosophical position survives without ever being coherent, and Nāgārjuna names it rather than merely refuting it. 汝自已為定，而所說不定: you take yourself to have settled it; nothing you say settles anything.
The last verse then opens the door outward, and this is the sentence to carry into the next two chapters: and all things are the same. Defilement was only the example. The pattern — a quality and its bearer, neither identical nor separable, neither joined nor apart — is the shape of every relation the treatise will examine from here: arising and the thing that arises, act and agent, fire and fuel, seer and seen. Piṅgala's closing phrase is the whole positive teaching in six characters: 因緣所成, made by causes and conditions. Not nothing. Just nothing standing on its own.
Chapter 7 · Examining the Three Marks 觀三相品第七
This is the longest chapter in the treatise, and its target is the definition of a conditioned thing itself. Abhidharma held that whatever is conditioned bears three marks — it arises, it abides, it ceases — and that these marks are what make it a real event in the world rather than a mere name. Nāgārjuna asks whether the marks are themselves conditioned or unconditioned, and both answers fail. Then he asks whether arising can arise, and gets an infinite regress; whether it can light itself up like a lamp, and gets a lamp that never meets any darkness; whether a thing arises when it has arisen, or when it has not, or in the act of arising. When arising falls, abiding and ceasing fall with it — and so, in the last verses, does the whole distinction between the conditioned and the unconditioned.
Conditioned or Unconditioned? 有為・無為
問曰：經說有為法有三相：生、住、滅。萬物以生法生、以住法住、以滅法滅，是故有諸法。
答曰：不爾。何以故？三相無決定故。是三相為是有為能作有為相？為是無為能作有為相？二俱不然。何以故？
Question: The sūtras say that conditioned things have three marks: arising, abiding, and ceasing. The ten thousand things arise by an arising, abide by an abiding, cease by a ceasing — and therefore things exist.
Answer: Not so. Why? Because the three marks are not fixed. Are these three marks conditioned, and able to serve as marks of the conditioned? Or unconditioned, and able to serve as marks of the conditioned? Neither will do. Why?
若生是有為， 則應有三相；
若生是無為， 何名有為相？
If arising is conditioned,
then it must have the three marks;
and if arising is unconditioned,
how is it a mark of the conditioned?
若生是有為，應有三相生住滅。是事不然。何以故？共相違故。相違者，生相應生法、住相應住法、滅相應滅法。若法生時，不應有住、滅相違法。一時則不然，如明闇不俱。以是故，生不應是有為法；住、滅相亦應如是。
問曰：若生非有為，若是無為，有何咎？
答曰：若生是無為，云何能為有為法作相。何以故？無為法無性故。因滅有為名無為，是故說不生不滅名無為相，更無自相。是故無法，不能為法作相，如兔角龜毛等不能為法作相。是故生非無為；住、滅亦如是。復次：
If arising is conditioned, it must have the three marks — arising, abiding, and ceasing. That will not do. Why? Because they contradict one another. By contradiction I mean: the mark of arising makes a thing arise, the mark of abiding makes it abide, the mark of ceasing makes it cease. While a thing is arising there ought not to be the contradictory marks of abiding and ceasing in it. All at one time will not do, as light and darkness are not together. For this reason arising cannot be a conditioned thing; and the same must hold for the marks of abiding and ceasing.
Question: If arising is not conditioned, and is instead unconditioned, what is wrong with that?
Answer: If arising is unconditioned, how can it serve as the mark of a conditioned thing? Why? Because the unconditioned has no nature. It is by the ceasing of the conditioned that a thing is called unconditioned, and so "neither arising nor ceasing" is said to be the mark of the unconditioned, which has no further mark of its own. It is therefore nothing at all, and what is nothing cannot serve as the mark of anything — as a rabbit's horn or a turtle's fur cannot be the mark of anything. So arising is not unconditioned; and the same holds for abiding and ceasing. Furthermore:
三相若聚散， 不能有所相；
云何於一處， 一時有三相？
Whether gathered or scattered, the three marks
cannot mark anything at all;
and how, in one place and at one time,
could there be three marks together?
是生、住、滅相，若一一能為有為法作相？若和合能與有為法作相？二俱不然。何以故？若謂一一者，於一處中或有有相、或有無相，生時無住、滅，住時無生、滅，滅時無生、住。若和合者，共相違法，云何一時俱？若謂三相更有三相者，是亦不然。何以故？
Do these marks of arising, abiding, and ceasing serve as the mark of a conditioned thing one at a time? Or do they serve together? Neither will do. Why? If one at a time, then in one place some marks would be present and others absent: at the time of arising there is no abiding or ceasing, at the time of abiding no arising or ceasing, at the time of ceasing no arising or abiding. And if together, then since these factors contradict one another, how could they be present all at once? And if you say that the three marks have three further marks, that will not do either. Why?
若謂生住滅， 更有有為相，
是即為無窮， 無即非有為。
If you say that arising, abiding, and ceasing
have further marks of the conditioned,
then it runs on without end;
and if they have none, they are not conditioned.
若謂生、住、滅更有有為相，生更有生、有住、有滅。如是三相，復應更有相，若爾則無窮。若更無相，是三相則不名有為法，亦不能為有為法作相。
If you say that arising, abiding, and ceasing have further marks of the conditioned, then arising has a further arising, abiding, and ceasing; and those three marks must in turn have marks of their own, and so it runs on without end. But if they have no further marks, then the three marks are not conditioned things at all, and cannot serve as the marks of conditioned things.
The trap is set in three verses, and it is worth seeing exactly how it closes. Abhidharma needed the three marks to do a specific job: to distinguish real, occurring things from mere fictions. A conditioned thing is one that comes up, lasts a moment, and goes. Fine — but what about arising itself? Is it one of the things that come up, last, and go?
Say yes, and arising must carry the three marks too, since that is what being conditioned means. Now two problems arrive at once. First, the marks contradict each other: something arising is not simultaneously ceasing, any more than a room is lit and dark at once. Second, if arising needs its own arising, that one needs its own, and there is no floor to the stack. Say no instead — arising is unconditioned, exempt, outside the system — and Piṅgala's reply is quiet and lethal. The unconditioned in this scheme is defined purely negatively, as what does not arise and does not cease. It has no positive character of its own. And nothing cannot be the mark of something: a rabbit's horn does not certify anything.
Notice what the argument is not saying. It is not saying that nothing comes into being. It is saying that "arising" cannot be a further item in the inventory alongside the things that arise. The moment you make it an item, you must ask whether that item is itself an event, and both answers destroy it. This is the same move Chapter 1 made with the four conditions and the same move Chapter 2 made with motion: the process refuses to be found as a thing over and above what is processing.
An Arising of Arising 生生・本生
問曰：汝說三相為無窮。是事不然。生、住、滅雖是有為，而非無窮。何以故？
Question: You say the three marks run on without end. That is not so. Although arising, abiding, and ceasing are conditioned, there is no endless regress. Why?
生生之所生， 生於彼本生，
本生之所生， 還生於生生。
What the arising-of-arising gives rise to
is that root arising there;
and what the root arising gives rise to
is, in its turn, the arising-of-arising.
法生時通自體七法共生：一法、二生、三住、四滅、五生生、六住住、七滅滅。是七法中，本生除自體，能生六法。生生能生本生，本生能生生生，是故三相雖是有為，而非無窮。
答曰：
When a thing arises, seven factors arise together, counting the thing itself: first the thing, second arising, third abiding, fourth ceasing, fifth the arising-of-arising, sixth the abiding-of-abiding, seventh the ceasing-of-ceasing. Among these seven, the root arising, leaving aside itself, gives rise to the other six. The arising-of-arising gives rise to the root arising, and the root arising gives rise to the arising-of-arising. Therefore, although the three marks are conditioned, there is no endless regress.
Answer:
若謂是生生， 能生於本生；
生生從本生， 何能生本生？
If you say the arising-of-arising
can give rise to the root arising —
the arising-of-arising comes from the root arising,
so how can it give rise to the root arising?
若是生生能生本生者，是生生則不名從本生生。何以故？是生生從本生生，云何能生本生。復次：
If the arising-of-arising gives rise to the root arising, then the arising-of-arising cannot be said to arise from the root arising. Why? The arising-of-arising arises from the root arising — so how could it give rise to the root arising? Furthermore:
若謂是本生， 能生於生生；
本生從彼生， 何能生生生？
If you say the root arising
can give rise to the arising-of-arising —
the root arising arises from that one,
so how can it give rise to the arising-of-arising?
若謂本生能生生生者，是本生不名從生生生。何以故？是本生從生生生，云何能生生生？生生法應生本生。而今生生不能生本生，生生未有自體，何能生本生？是故本生不能生生生。
問曰：是生生生時，非先非後能生本生，但生生生時能生本生。
答曰：不然。何以故？
If you say the root arising gives rise to the arising-of-arising, then the root arising cannot be said to arise from the arising-of-arising. Why? The root arising arises from the arising-of-arising — so how could it give rise to the arising-of-arising? It is the arising-of-arising that is supposed to give rise to the root arising. But as things stand, the arising-of-arising cannot give rise to the root arising: it has no substance of its own yet, so how could it give rise to anything? And therefore the root arising cannot give rise to the arising-of-arising either.
Question: While the arising-of-arising is arising, it gives rise to the root arising neither before nor after; it is precisely while the arising-of-arising is arising that it gives rise to the root arising.
Answer: Not so. Why?
若生生生時， 能生於本生；
生生尚未有， 何能生本生？
If, while the arising-of-arising is arising,
it can give rise to the root arising —
the arising-of-arising is not yet there,
so how can it give rise to the root arising?
若謂生生生時能生本生可爾，而實未有，是故生生生時不能生本生。復次：
It would be all right to say that the arising-of-arising gives rise to the root arising while it is arising — if it were actually there. But it is not yet there, and so, while it is arising, the arising-of-arising cannot give rise to the root arising. Furthermore:
若本生生時， 能生於生生；
本生尚未有， 何能生生生？
If, while the root arising is arising,
it can give rise to the arising-of-arising —
the root arising is not yet there,
so how can it give rise to the arising-of-arising?
若謂是本生生時能生生生可爾，而實未有，是故本生生時不能生生生。
It would be all right to say that the root arising gives rise to the arising-of-arising while it is arising — if it were actually there. But it is not yet there, and so, while it is arising, the root arising cannot give rise to the arising-of-arising.
This is the most technical stretch of the treatise, and also one of the most revealing, because here we can watch a great system defend itself and see precisely where the defense buckles.
The Sarvāstivāda answer to the regress is ingenious. Yes, arising must itself arise; but the extra arising it needs is supplied by the original arising, and the original arising's own arising is supplied by that extra one. Piṅgala lays out the whole apparatus: seven factors born in a single package — the thing, the three marks, and three secondary marks, an arising-of-arising, an abiding-of-abiding, a ceasing-of-ceasing. The root arising produces the other six; the little arising produces the root arising. Each holds the other up. The stack does not go to infinity because it closes into a loop.
Nāgārjuna's reply takes three sentences and is worth internalizing, because the same objection retires a great many clever proposals. If A produces B, A cannot also be produced by B — not because of some rule of etiquette, but because to produce something you must already be there, and to be produced by it you must not yet be. The loop needs each partner to be both present and absent at the same moment. Two men standing in mid-air, each holding the other up, is not a solution to the problem of falling.
The opponent's last move is the interesting one: it is precisely while arising that it does the producing — neither before nor after, but in the act. This is the intuition that keeps the whole picture of causation alive for us, the sense that in the very moment of happening a thing has enough reality to make something else happen. Nāgārjuna answers with a phrase he will use again and again: 尚未有 — it is not yet there. Something half-arisen is not half a producer. It has not yet reached the point where there is anything to do the producing.
The Lamp and the Darkness 燈與闇
問曰：
Question:
如燈能自照， 亦能照於彼；
生法亦如是， 自生亦生彼。
Just as a lamp can light itself
and can also light other things,
so it is with arising:
it gives rise to itself and to others.
如燈入於闇室，照了諸物亦能自照。生亦如是，能生於彼亦能自生。
答曰：不然。何以故？
When a lamp is carried into a dark room it lights up the things there, and lights up itself as well. Arising is the same: it gives rise to other things, and gives rise to itself.
Answer: Not so. Why?
燈中自無闇， 住處亦無闇，
破闇乃名照， 無闇則無照。
In the lamp itself there is no darkness,
nor is there darkness where it stands;
to dispel darkness is what lighting means,
and with no darkness there is no lighting.
燈體自無闇，明所及處亦無闇，明闇相違故。破闇故名照，無闇則無照，何得言燈自照亦照彼？
問曰：是燈非未生有照，亦非生已有照，但燈生時能自照亦照彼。
答曰：
The body of the lamp has no darkness in it, and wherever its light reaches there is no darkness either, since light and darkness contradict each other. It is called lighting because it dispels darkness, and where there is no darkness there is no lighting. So how can one say that the lamp lights itself and lights other things?
Question: The lamp does not light before it has arisen, nor after it has already arisen; it is just while the lamp is arising that it lights itself and lights other things.
Answer:
云何燈生時， 而能破於闇？
此燈初生時， 不能及於闇。
How, while the lamp is arising,
could it dispel any darkness?
When this lamp first arises
it does not reach the darkness at all.
燈生時名半生半未生，燈體未成就，云何能破闇？又燈不能及闇，如人得賊乃名為破。若謂燈雖不到闇而能破闇者，是亦不然。何以故？
"While the lamp is arising" means half arisen and half not yet arisen; the body of the lamp is not yet complete, so how could it dispel darkness? Moreover the lamp does not reach the darkness — it is only when a man lays hands on the thief that we speak of overcoming him. And if you say the lamp dispels the darkness without ever reaching it, that will not do either. Why?
燈若未及闇， 而能破闇者，
燈在於此間， 則破一切闇。
If a lamp that has not reached the darkness
can nevertheless dispel it,
then a lamp standing here
would dispel all the darkness there is.
若燈有力，不到闇而能破者。此處燃燈，應破一切處闇，俱不及故。復次燈不應自照、照彼。何以故？
If the lamp had the power to dispel darkness without reaching it, then lighting a lamp in this room would dispel the darkness everywhere, since it equally fails to reach all of it. Furthermore, the lamp cannot light itself or light others. Why?
若燈能自照， 亦能照於彼；
闇亦應自闇， 亦能闇於彼。
If a lamp can light itself
and can also light other things,
then darkness should darken itself
and be able to darken other things.
若燈與闇相違故，能自照亦照於彼。闇與燈相違故，亦應自蔽蔽彼。若闇與燈相違，不能自蔽蔽彼。燈與闇相違，亦不應自照亦照彼。是故燈喻非也。破生因緣未盡故，今當更說。
If the lamp lights itself and lights others because it stands contrary to darkness, then darkness, standing contrary to the lamp, ought likewise to obscure itself and obscure others. And if darkness, contrary to the lamp, cannot obscure itself and obscure others, then the lamp, contrary to darkness, cannot light itself and light others either. The lamp simile therefore fails. The refutation of arising is not yet exhausted, and so more will now be said.
The lamp is the best image in the chapter and the one most worth carrying away, because the opponent's intuition is genuinely strong. Of course a lamp lights itself. You can see the lamp. What more could self-illumination mean?
Nāgārjuna's answer is to insist on what "lighting" actually names. Lighting is the removal of darkness — that is not a poetic definition but the only content the word has. So look for the darkness that the lamp removes from itself. There is none. The lamp was never dark; there is no darkness in the flame and none in the space the flame occupies. Which means the lamp cannot light itself, not because it is too dim, but because there is no work there for lighting to do. Seeing the lamp is not the lamp lighting itself; it is a lamp being seen.
Then the opponent retreats to the moment of ignition — the same "in the very act" move he made about arising — and the reply is exact: a lamp being lit is 半生半未生, half arisen and half not, and half a lamp does not do a whole lamp's work. Piṅgala adds an image that is almost a small joke, and repays a second reading: you only say a man overcame the thief when he actually got his hands on him. Light must meet darkness somewhere to overcome it, and there is nowhere the two of them meet — where light is, darkness has already gone. Push the other way and you get verse 12's absurdity: if a lamp works without reaching, one candle in a room should abolish night everywhere on earth, since it equally fails to reach every dark place.
Verse 13 lands the last blow by symmetry, and it is the kind of argument that shows how much of Nāgārjuna's method is simply refusing to let an opponent use a rule once and then drop it. If contrariety is what lets the lamp act on itself, then darkness is equally contrary to light, and darkness should darken itself. It does not. The rule was never a rule; it was a picture we were fond of.
What the simile was defending, remember, is the claim that arising arises itself. Behind that lies something most of us assume without ever examining it: that events carry their own occurrence with them, that happening is self-supporting the way light seems self-showing. The lamp goes out, and the assumption goes with it.
Arisen, Not Yet Arisen, Arising 已生・未生・生時
此生若未生， 云何能自生？
若生已自生， 生已何用生？
If this arising has not yet arisen,
how could it give rise to itself?
And if, once arisen, it gives rise to itself,
what use is arising to what has arisen?
是生自生時，為生已生？為未生生？若未生生，則是無法，無法何能自生？若謂生已生，則為已成，不須復生，如已作不應更作。若已生、若未生，是二俱不生，故無生。汝先說生如燈，能自生亦生彼，是事不然；住、滅亦如是。復次：
When this arising gives rise to itself, does it do so having already arisen, or not yet having arisen? If it arises not yet having arisen, then it is nothing at all — and what is nothing cannot give rise to itself. And if you say it arises having already arisen, then it is already accomplished and needs no further arising, as what has been done need not be done again. Whether already arisen or not yet arisen, neither of the two arises, and so there is no arising. What you said before — that arising is like a lamp, giving rise to itself and to others — will not do; and the same holds for abiding and ceasing. Furthermore:
生非生已生， 亦非未生生，
生時亦不生， 去來中已答。
Arising does not arise once arisen,
nor does it arise not yet arisen,
nor does it arise while arising:
this was answered under going and coming.
生名眾緣和合有生，已生中無作故無生，未生中無作故無生。生時亦不然，離生法生時不可得、離生時生法亦不可得、云何生時生？是事〈去來〉中已答。已生法不可生。何以故？生已復生，如是展轉則為無窮，如作已復作。復次若生已更生者，以何生法生？是生相未生。而言生已生者，則自違所說。何以故？生相未生而汝謂生。若未生謂生者，法或可生已而生、或可未生而生。汝先說生已生，是則不定。復次如燒已不應復燒、去已不應復去，如是等因緣故，生已不應生。未生法亦不生。何以故？法若未生則不應與生緣和合，若不與生緣和合則無法生。若法未與生緣和合而生者，應無作法而作、無去法而去、無染法而染、無恚法而恚、無癡法而癡。如是則皆破世間法，是故未生法不生。復次若未生法生者，世間未生法皆應生，一切凡夫未生菩提今應生菩提，不壞法阿羅漢無有煩惱今應生煩惱，兔等無角今皆應生。但是事不然，是故未生法亦不生。
"Arising" means that when a host of conditions comes together there is arising. In what has already arisen there is no work to be done, so there is no arising; in what has not yet arisen there is no work to be done, so there is no arising. "While arising" will not do either: apart from the thing arising, no time of arising can be found, and apart from the time of arising, no thing arising can be found — so how could there be arising while arising? This was answered in the chapter on Going and Coming.
What has already arisen cannot arise. Why? If what has arisen arises again, it would go on and on without end, like doing again what has already been done. Furthermore, if what has arisen arises again, by what arising does it arise? That mark of arising has not arisen; and to say "it arises once arisen" is to contradict your own statement. Why? Because the mark of arising has not arisen and yet you call it arisen. And if what has not arisen may be called arisen, then a thing might arise once arisen, or might arise not yet arisen — so your earlier claim that it arises once arisen settles nothing. Furthermore: what has been burned should not be burned again, and what has been walked should not be walked again. For reasons such as these, what has already arisen does not arise.
Nor does what has not yet arisen arise. Why? If a thing has not arisen, it has not come together with the conditions of arising; and if it has not come together with the conditions of arising, no thing arises. Were a thing to arise without having come together with the conditions of arising, then there would be doing where there is nothing done, going where there is no going, defilement where there is nothing defiled, hatred where there is nothing hated, delusion where there is nothing deluded. That would destroy the ordinary business of the world entirely, and so what has not arisen does not arise. Furthermore, if what has not arisen arose, then everything in the world that has not arisen ought to arise: every ordinary person, not having given rise to awakening, ought to give rise to awakening now; an arhat of unshakable nature, who has no afflictions, ought to give rise to afflictions now; hares and the like, which have no horns, ought to grow them now. But this is not the case, and so what has not arisen does not arise either.
問曰：未生法不生者，以未有緣、無作、無作者、無時、無方等故不生。若有緣、有作、有作者、有時、有方等和合故，未生法生。是故若說一切未生法皆不生，是事不爾。
答曰：若法有緣、有時、有方等和合則生者，先有亦不生、先無亦不生、有無亦不生。三種先已破，是故生已不生。未生亦不生、生時亦不生。何以故？已生分不生，未生分亦不生，如先答。復次若離生有生時者，應生時生。但離生無生時，是故生時亦不生。復次若言生時生者，則有二生過：一以生故名生時；二以生時中生。二皆不然。無有二法，云何有二生？是故生時亦不生。復次生法未發則無生時，生時無故生何所依？是故不得言生時生。如是推求，生已無生、未生無生、生時無生，無生故生不成，生不成故住、滅亦不成。生、住、滅不成，故有為法不成。是故偈中說去未去去時中已答。
Question: What has not arisen does not arise because as yet there is no condition, no act, no agent, no time, no place, and so on. But when condition, act, agent, time, and place do come together, then what has not arisen arises. So it is wrong to say that nothing unarisen ever arises.
Answer: If a thing arises when condition, time, place, and the rest come together, then it does not arise if it was there beforehand, nor if it was not there beforehand, nor if it both was and was not. These three have already been broken, and so what has arisen does not arise, what has not arisen does not arise, and what is arising does not arise. Why? The already-arisen portion does not arise, and the not-yet-arisen portion does not arise either, as was answered before. Furthermore, if there were a time of arising apart from arising, then a thing could arise at the time of arising; but apart from arising there is no time of arising, and so there is no arising while arising. Furthermore, if you say a thing arises while arising, there is the fault of two arisings: first, it is called "the time of arising" because of an arising; second, there is an arising within that time of arising. Neither will do. There are not two things there — how could there be two arisings? So there is no arising while arising. Furthermore, if the arising thing has not set out, there is no time of arising; and since there is no time of arising, on what would the arising rest? One therefore cannot say that a thing arises while arising. Searching in this way: no arising in what has arisen, no arising in what has not arisen, no arising while arising. Since there is no arising, arising is not established; and since arising is not established, neither are abiding and ceasing. And since arising, abiding, and ceasing are not established, conditioned things are not established. This is why the verse says it was answered under "gone, not gone, and going."
問曰：我不定言生已生、未生生、生時生，但眾緣和合故有生。
答曰：汝雖有是說，此則不然。何以故？
Question: I do not say definitely that a thing arises once arisen, or not yet arisen, or while arising. I say only that there is arising because a host of conditions comes together.
Answer: Say it though you may, it will not do. Why?
若謂生時生， 是事已不成；
云何眾緣合， 爾時而得生？
If you say a thing arises while arising,
that has already been shown not to hold;
then how, when the conditions come together,
could there be any arising at that time?
生時生已種種因緣破，汝今何以更說眾緣和合故有生？若眾緣具足、不具足，皆與生同破。復次：
Arising while arising has been broken by arguments of every kind. Why do you now say once more that there is arising because a host of conditions comes together? Whether the conditions are complete or incomplete, they are broken along with arising. Furthermore:
若法眾緣生， 即是寂滅性；
是故生生時， 是二俱寂滅。
If a thing arises from a host of conditions,
its very nature is quiescence;
and therefore arising and the time of arising,
these two are both quiescent.
眾緣所生法，無自性故寂滅，寂滅名為無此無彼無相，斷言語道、滅諸戲論。眾緣名，如因縷有布、因蒲有席。若縷自有定相，不應從麻出。若布自有定相，不應從縷出。而實從縷有布、從麻有縷，是故縷亦無定性、布亦無定性。如燃、可燃因緣和合成，無有自性，可燃無故燃亦無、燃無故可燃亦無。一切法亦如是，是故從眾緣生法無自性，無自性故空，如野馬無實。是故偈中說生與生時二俱寂滅，不應說生時生。汝雖種種因緣欲成生相，皆是戲論，非寂滅相。
What is produced from a host of conditions is quiescent, because it has no inherent nature — svabhāva, a nature of its own. "Quiescent" means: no this, no that, no mark at all; the road of words cut off, all conceptual elaboration extinguished. As for "a host of conditions": from thread there is cloth, from rushes there is a mat. If thread had a fixed character of its own, it ought not to come out of flax; if cloth had a fixed character of its own, it ought not to come out of thread. But in fact cloth comes from thread and thread comes from flax, and so thread has no fixed nature and cloth has no fixed nature. It is like fire and fuel, which are made by the coming together of causes and conditions and have no inherent nature: with no fuel there is no fire, and with no fire there is no fuel. All things are like this. What arises from a host of conditions therefore has no inherent nature; having no inherent nature it is empty, as unreal as a mirage. This is why the verse says that arising and the time of arising are both quiescent, and that one should not speak of arising while arising. Though you try by every sort of argument to establish a mark of arising, it is all conceptual elaboration, and not the mark of quiescence.
問曰：定有三世別異。未來世法得生，因緣即生。何故言無生？答曰：
Question: The three times are definitely distinct. A thing of the future time can arise, and when its causal conditions are present it arises. Why do you say there is no arising? Answer:
若有未生法， 說言有生者，
此法先已有， 更復何用生？
If there is a thing not yet arisen
and you say that it arises,
then that thing is already there beforehand —
what further use has it for arising?
若未來世中有未生法而生，是法先已有，何用更生？有法不應更生。
問曰：未來雖有，非如現在相，以現在相故說生。
答曰：現在相未來中無，若無，云何言未來生法生；若有，不名未來，應名現在，現在不應更生。二俱無生，故不生。復次汝謂生時生亦能生彼。今當更說。
If in the future time there is a thing not yet arisen, and it arises, then that thing is already there beforehand — what use has it for arising again? What already exists ought not to arise again.
Question: Though it exists in the future, it does not have the character of the present; and it is because of the character of the present that we speak of arising.
Answer: The character of the present is not in the future. If it is not there, how can you say that a future thing arises? And if it is there, the thing is not called future but present — and the present should not arise again. Neither way is there arising, and so there is no arising. Furthermore, you hold that while a thing is arising it can also give rise to others. More will now be said.
Two things in this long stretch deserve a reader's full attention, and they pull in opposite directions, which is the point.
The first is the safety rail. When the opponent proposes that the unarisen simply arises, Piṅgala's reply is not metaphysical — it is a list of consequences that any reader can test: doing with nothing done, going with no going, hatred with nothing to hate. And then three examples chosen to sting: every ordinary person would burst into awakening this instant, an arhat free of afflictions would suddenly grow some, and hares would sprout horns. He is not being playful. He is demonstrating that Madhyamaka's denial of arising is not the claim that anything may pop into being from nowhere. That claim would 破世間法, destroy the ordinary business of the world, and Piṅgala names it as the fault it is. Emptiness and randomness are opposites, not neighbors.
The second is verse 17, which is the philosophical summit of the chapter and one of the great lines in the treatise: if a thing arises from a host of conditions, its very nature is quiescence. Read that slowly, because it is not a negation. It is an identification. Being dependently produced and being 寂滅 — still, quenched, at rest — are not two facts about a thing that happen to coincide. They are one fact stated twice. Whatever comes about through conditions was never a self-standing item that needed to be pacified; it has been at rest all along, and only our description of it was in motion.
Piṅgala's examples are deliberately homely: cloth from thread, thread from flax, a mat from rushes. Ask where the "cloth-ness" lives and you cannot find it in the threads, yet there is nowhere else to look. Then he reaches for the image that will occupy the whole of the next chapter — fire and fuel, each of which is what it is only because of the other — and finishes with 野馬, the "wild horses" of shimmering heat on a plain that a traveler mistakes for water. The mirage is not nothing: the light really is bending, the shimmer really is there to be seen. What is not there is the water. That is the exact register of Nāgārjuna's emptiness, and it is worth holding on to for the rest of the treatise.
No Fifth Way for Arising 有・無・有無
若言生時生， 是能有所生；
何得更有生， 而能生是生？
If you say that while arising it arises
and is able to give rise to something,
how can there be a further arising
able to give rise to that arising?
若生生時能生彼，是生誰復能生？
If arising gives rise to other things while it is arising, then what in turn gives rise to that arising?
若謂更有生， 生生則無窮，
離生生有生， 法皆能自生。
If you say there is a further arising,
then arising runs on without end;
and if arising stands without an arising-of-arising,
then all things can give rise to themselves.
若生更有生，生則無窮。若是生更無生而自生者，一切法亦皆能自生，而實不爾。復次：
If arising has a further arising, then arising runs on without end. And if this arising has no further arising and yet gives rise to itself, then all things whatever could give rise to themselves — which is not in fact the case. Furthermore:
有法不應生， 無亦不應生，
有無亦不生， 此義先已說。
What exists ought not to arise,
nor ought what does not exist to arise,
nor does what both exists and does not:
this meaning has been stated before.
凡所有生，為有法有生？為無法有生？為有無法有生？是皆不然，是事先已說。離此三事更無有生，是故無生。復次：
For any arising at all: is it what exists that arises, or what does not exist, or what both exists and does not? None of these will do, as has been said before. Apart from these three there is no arising, and so there is no arising. Furthermore:
若諸法滅時， 是時不應生；
法若不滅者， 終無有是事。
When things are ceasing,
at that time they ought not to arise;
and that a thing should not be ceasing —
there is in the end no such case.
若法滅相，是法不應生。何以故？二相相違故。一是滅相，知法是滅。一是生相，知法是生。二相相違法，一時則不然，是故滅相法不應生。
問曰：若滅相法不應生，不滅相法應生。
答曰：一切有為法念念滅故，無不滅法。離有為，無有決定無為法。無為法但有名字，是故說不滅法，終無有是事。
If a thing bears the mark of ceasing, it ought not to arise. Why? Because the two marks contradict each other. One is the mark of ceasing, by which we know a thing is ceasing; the other is the mark of arising, by which we know a thing is arising. Two contradictory marks at one time will not do, and so a thing marked by ceasing ought not to arise.
Question: If a thing marked by ceasing ought not to arise, then a thing not marked by ceasing ought to arise.
Answer: Since all conditioned things cease moment by moment, there is no thing that is not ceasing. And apart from the conditioned there is no fixed unconditioned thing: the unconditioned has nothing but a name. That is why it is said that of a thing not ceasing there is in the end no such case.
Nothing Abides 觀住
問曰：若法無生，應有住。
答曰：
Question: If things do not arise, at least they must abide.
Answer:
不住法不住， 住法亦不住，
住時亦不住， 無生云何住？
What does not abide does not abide,
what abides does not abide either,
nor does it abide while abiding:
with no arising, how could there be abiding?
不住法不住，無住相故。住法亦不住。何以故？已有住故。因去故有住，若住法先有，不應更住。住時亦不住，離住、不住更無住時，是故亦不住。如是一切處求住不可得故，即是無生。若無生，云何有住？復次：
What does not abide does not abide, since it has no mark of abiding. What abides does not abide either. Why? Because it already has abiding. Abiding is there because of departing; and if the abiding thing is already there, it ought not to abide again. Nor does it abide while abiding, for apart from abiding and not-abiding there is no time of abiding, and so it does not abide there either. Since abiding cannot be found by searching anywhere at all, this is just no-arising. And if there is no arising, how could there be abiding? Furthermore:
若諸法滅時， 是則不應住；
法若不滅者， 終無有是事。
When things are ceasing,
at that time they ought not to abide;
and that a thing should not be ceasing —
there is in the end no such case.
若法滅相，是法無有住相。何以故？一法中有二相相違故，一是滅相、二是住相。一時一處有住滅相，是事不然，是故不得言滅相法有住。
問曰：若法不滅，應有住。
答曰：無有不滅法。何以故？
If a thing bears the mark of ceasing, it has no mark of abiding. Why? Because there would then be two contradictory marks in one thing, the mark of ceasing and the mark of abiding. That the marks of abiding and ceasing should be in one place at one time will not do, and so one cannot say that a thing marked by ceasing abides.
Question: If a thing is not ceasing, then it must abide.
Answer: There is no thing that is not ceasing. Why?
所有一切法， 皆是老死相，
終不見有法， 離老死有住。
All things whatsoever
bear the marks of aging and death;
no thing is ever seen
that abides apart from aging and death.
一切法生時，無常常隨逐。無常有二，名老及死。如是一切法常有老死，故無住時。復次：
Whenever anything arises, impermanence follows it constantly. Impermanence takes two forms, called aging and death. Since all things always have aging and death with them, there is no time of abiding. Furthermore:
住不自相住， 亦不異相住；
如生不自生， 亦不異相生。
Abiding does not abide by its own mark,
nor does it abide by another's mark,
just as arising does not arise of itself,
nor arise by another's mark.
若有住法，為自相住？為他相住？二俱不然。若自相住，則為是常。一切有為法從眾緣生，若住法自住，則不名有為。住若自相住，法亦應自相住。如眼不能自見，住亦如是。若異相住，則住更有住，是則無窮。復次見異法生異相，不得不因異法而有異相，異相不定故。因異相而住者，是事不然。
If there is an abiding thing, does it abide by its own mark or by another's? Neither will do. If it abides by its own mark, then it is permanent. All conditioned things arise from a host of conditions; and if the abiding thing abides of itself, it is not called conditioned at all. If abiding abides by its own mark, then the thing too should abide by its own mark — but as the eye cannot see itself, so it is with abiding. And if it abides by another's mark, then abiding has a further abiding, and that runs on without end. Furthermore, one sees a different mark arise from a different thing, and a different mark cannot be had except in dependence on a different thing, so that the different mark is not fixed. To abide in dependence on a different mark will therefore not do.
Abiding is the mark that matters most to us emotionally, and it takes the fewest verses to break, because the Buddhist tradition had already done most of the work. If everything conditioned is passing away moment by moment, then "abiding" was never more than a name for a stretch of passing away that we did not happen to notice.
Verse 25 is the one to sit with, and it is written with unusual plainness: everything whatsoever wears the marks of aging and death, and nothing is ever seen abiding apart from them. Piṅgala's gloss makes it worse, or better, depending on your temperament — whenever anything arises, impermanence follows it constantly. Not later. Not at the end. The aging is not an event that overtakes a thing which was, until then, simply existing. There is no interval of bare existing for it to overtake. What we call the life of a thing and what we call its decay are the same stretch of time described with different feelings.
Then verse 26 applies the chapter's standing method to abiding, and the image is one Nāgārjuna's tradition returns to constantly: 如眼不能自見 — the eye cannot see itself. Whatever does the work cannot be its own object; the seeing that lands on everything else never lands on itself. Abiding cannot abide by its own abiding, any more than the eye can complete its work by turning around. And it cannot borrow abiding from something else, because then that something needs abiding of its own, and we are back in the stack with no floor.
One consolation is worth naming here, since the chapter offers none. Nothing in this argument says that the moments do not pass, that the child does not grow, that the friend does not age. It says the opposite of what a grieving reader might fear. There is no fixed thing being taken away, because there was never a fixed thing being kept.
Nothing Ceases 觀滅
問曰：若無住，應有滅。
答曰：無。何以故？
Question: If there is no abiding, then there must be ceasing.
Answer: There is not. Why?
法已滅不滅， 未滅亦不滅，
滅時亦不滅， 無生何有滅？
What has ceased does not cease,
what has not ceased does not cease either,
nor does it cease while ceasing:
with no arising, how could there be ceasing?
若法已滅則不滅，以先滅故。未滅亦不滅，離滅相故。滅時亦不滅，離二更無滅時。如是推求，滅法即是無生，無生何有滅？復次：
If a thing has already ceased it does not cease, since it ceased before. What has not ceased does not cease either, since it is apart from the mark of ceasing. Nor does it cease while ceasing, for apart from those two there is no time of ceasing. Searching in this way, ceasing is just no-arising; and with no arising, how could there be ceasing? Furthermore:
法若有住者， 是則不應滅；
法若不住者， 是亦不應滅。
If a thing abides,
then it ought not to cease;
and if a thing does not abide,
it ought not to cease either.
若法定住則無有滅。何以故？由有住相故。若住法滅，則有二相：住相、滅相。是故不得言住中有滅，如生死不得一時有。若法不住，亦無有滅。何以故？離住相故。若離住相則無法，無法云何滅？復次：
If a thing definitely abides there is no ceasing. Why? Because it has the mark of abiding; and if an abiding thing ceased, there would be two marks in it, the mark of abiding and the mark of ceasing. So one cannot say that there is ceasing within abiding, just as birth and death cannot be present at one time. And if a thing does not abide there is no ceasing either. Why? Because it is then apart from the mark of abiding — and apart from the mark of abiding there is no thing at all; and what is nothing, how could it cease? Furthermore:
是法於是時， 不於是時滅；
是法於異時， 不於異時滅。
A thing, at its own time,
does not cease at that time;
a thing, at another time,
does not cease at that other time.
若法有滅相，是法為自相滅？為異相滅？二俱不然。何以故？如乳不於乳時滅。隨有乳時，乳相定住故。非乳時亦不滅，若非乳不得言乳滅。復次：
If a thing bears the mark of ceasing, does it cease by its own mark or by another's? Neither will do. Why? Milk does not cease at the time it is milk, for as long as there is milk the mark of milk stands fixed. Nor does it cease at a time when it is not milk — for where there is no milk, one cannot say that milk ceases. Furthermore:
如一切諸法， 生相不可得；
以無生相故， 即亦無滅相。
Since in all things whatsoever
the mark of arising cannot be found,
then, there being no mark of arising,
there is no mark of ceasing either.
如先推求，一切法生相不可得，爾時即無滅相，破生故無生，無生云何有滅？若汝意猶未已，今當更說破滅因緣。
As was searched out before, the mark of arising cannot be found in anything; and then there is no mark of ceasing either. Since arising has been broken there is no arising, and with no arising how could there be ceasing? If you are still not satisfied, more will now be said to break ceasing.
若法是有者， 是即無有滅；
不應於一法， 而有有無相。
If a thing exists,
then there is no ceasing for it;
one thing ought not to bear
the marks of existing and not existing at once.
諸法有時，推求滅相不可得。何以故？云何一法中亦有亦無相？如光影不同處。復次：
When things exist, the mark of ceasing cannot be found by searching. Why? How could one thing bear the marks of both existing and not existing — as light and shadow are not in the same place? Furthermore:
若法是無者， 是即無有滅；
譬如第二頭， 無故不可斷。
If a thing does not exist,
then there is no ceasing for it —
as with a second head:
not being there, it cannot be cut off.
法若無者則無滅相，如第二頭、第三手，無故不可斷。復次：
If a thing does not exist it has no mark of ceasing — as with a second head or a third hand: not being there, they cannot be cut off. Furthermore:
法不自相滅， 他相亦不滅；
如自相不生， 他相亦不生。
A thing does not cease by its own mark,
nor does it cease by another's mark,
just as it does not arise by its own mark,
nor arise by another's mark.
如先說生相，生不自生亦不從他生。若以自體生，是則不然，一切物皆從眾緣生。如指端不能自觸，如是生不能自生。從他生亦不然。何以故？生未有故，不應從他生。是生無故無自體，自體無故他亦無，是故從他生亦不然。滅法亦如是，不自相滅、不他相滅。復次：
As was said before about the mark of arising: arising does not arise of itself, nor does it arise from another. That it should arise from its own substance will not do, for everything arises from a host of conditions; as a fingertip cannot touch itself, so arising cannot give rise to itself. Nor will arising from another do. Why? Because the arising is not yet there, and so cannot arise from another. Since this arising does not exist it has no substance of its own; and since it has no substance of its own, there is no other either — so arising from another will not do. It is the same with ceasing: it does not cease by its own mark, nor by another's. Furthermore:
Ceasing is dispatched with the same three-times argument used against arising, and then with two images that are worth keeping.
The first is the milk. When does milk cease? Not while it is milk — for as long as there is milk, milk is exactly what is there, and nothing that is fully itself is in the act of stopping. Not after it is no longer milk — because then there is no milk left to do any ceasing. The moment of turning is precisely the moment we cannot locate, and we cannot locate it because we assumed there were two fixed states with a knife-edge between them. There is only curd where there was milk, and a word we use for the stretch in between.
The second is the second head. If something does not exist, it cannot be destroyed: nobody can cut off a head you do not have, or amputate a third hand. This is the argument's protection against being misread, and English readers need it more than most. Ceasing requires something that was really there to stop; and if arising has already been shown not to establish any such self-standing thing, there is nothing whose ceasing could be a genuine event. The claim is not that things vanish. It is that "vanishing," like "arising," turns out to have no findable object once you look for the item it was supposed to happen to.
Verse 31's image is the sharpest miniature in the chapter: 如光影不同處, light and shadow are not in the same place. A thing that exists cannot at the same moment carry the mark of not existing, and ceasing would require exactly that — one item, in one instant, both there and going. We are so used to speaking of a thing "in the process of ending" that we never notice we have asked one thing to be in two conditions at once.
Neither Conditioned nor Unconditioned 如幻如夢
生住滅不成， 故無有有為；
有為法無故， 何得有無為？
Since arising, abiding, and ceasing are not established,
there are no conditioned things;
and since conditioned things do not exist,
how could there be the unconditioned?
汝先說有生、住、滅相故有有為，以有有為故有無為。今以理推求，三相不可得，云何得有有為？如先說，無有無相法，有為法無故，何得有無為？無為相名不生不住不滅。止有為相故名無為相，無為自無別相，因是三相有無為相。如火為熱相、地為堅相、水為冷相，無為則不然。
問曰：若是生、住、滅畢竟無者，云何論中得說名字？
答曰：
You said before that because there are the marks of arising, abiding, and ceasing there are conditioned things, and that because there are conditioned things there is the unconditioned. But now, searching by reason, the three marks cannot be found — so how could there be conditioned things? As was said before, there is no thing without a mark; and since conditioned things do not exist, how could there be the unconditioned? The mark of the unconditioned is called not arising, not abiding, not ceasing. It is called the mark of the unconditioned only because it stops the marks of the conditioned; the unconditioned has no separate mark of its own, and it is in dependence on these three marks that there is any mark of the unconditioned at all. Fire has heat for its mark, earth has hardness, water has coolness — but with the unconditioned it is not so.
Question: If arising, abiding, and ceasing are ultimately nothing, how can the treatise use their names at all?
Answer:
如幻亦如夢， 如乾闥婆城，
所說生住滅， 其相亦如是。
As with an illusion, as with a dream,
as with a city of the gandharvas,
so with the arising, abiding, and ceasing
that are spoken of: such is their character.
生、住、滅相無有決定，凡人貪著謂有決定。諸賢聖憐愍欲止其顛倒，還以其所著名字為說，語言雖同其心則異。如是說生、住、滅相，不應有難。如幻化所作，不應責其所由，不應於中有憂喜想，但應眼見而已。如夢中所見不應求實，如乾闥婆城日出時現而無有實，但假為名字不久則滅。生、住、滅亦如是，凡夫分別為有，智者推求則不可得。
The marks of arising, abiding, and ceasing are not fixed, yet ordinary people cling to them and take them to be fixed. The worthy and the noble, out of compassion, wishing to put a stop to this inversion, speak to them using the very names they cling to; the words are the same but the mind behind them is not. To speak of the marks of arising, abiding, and ceasing in this way is open to no objection. As with what an illusionist conjures, one should not demand where it came from, nor entertain thoughts of sorrow or delight about it, but simply see it with one's eyes. As with what is seen in a dream, one should not look in it for anything real. As with a city of the gandharvas, which appears as the sun comes up and has nothing real in it, but is merely given a name and before long is gone. Arising, abiding, and ceasing are the same: ordinary people discriminate them as existing, but when the wise search for them they cannot be found.
The last two verses close the chapter by taking away the exit. Verse 34 makes the point that the whole treatise depends on: the unconditioned was never an independent category. It is defined as the absence of the three marks, and an absence needs something to be the absence of. Remove the conditioned and you have not been left with the unconditioned shining alone. You have removed both terms of a pair at once. Piṅgala's contrast is exact — fire really does have heat as its own mark, and earth hardness, and water coolness, but the unconditioned has no such positive character. This is not a demotion of nirvāṇa; it is a warning about what kind of thing the word can name, and Chapter 25 will take it up in earnest.
Then the objection every honest reader has been holding since verse 1: if none of this is real, why have you spent thirty-four verses using the words? The answer is one of the most important passages in the commentary, and it is not evasive. The words are borrowed. The teachers take up the very vocabulary their listeners are attached to and speak in it, 語言雖同其心則異 — the words are the same, but the mind behind them is not. A doctor uses the patient's own name for the illness.
The three similes are chosen with care and do different work. The conjurer's illusion is seen — Piṅgala's advice is to stop demanding its provenance and stop having feelings about it, but simply to look. The dream is believed while it lasts, and the error is to search inside it for something solid. And the city of the gandharvas — the shimmering mirage-city of celestial musicians that Indian literature places on the horizon at sunrise — appears at a distance, has a name, and dissolves. Not one of these is nothing at all. Each is a genuine appearance with no findable substance behind it, and that difference is the whole of the chapter's teaching.
Which is why the closing sentence is not despairing but exact: ordinary people discriminate arising and abiding and ceasing as things that exist; the wise go looking, and find nothing to grasp. Not "find that nothing exists." Find nothing to grasp. The world is still entirely there, and the three marks still describe it well enough to plant a field by. What they do not do is name three real events happening to real items — and this, not the abolition of the world, is what the chapter has taken thirty-five verses to show.
Chapter 8 · Examining Act and Agent 觀作作者品第八
The same argument once more, now on the ground where it matters most to a moral being. There is a deed, there is a doer, and there is the means by which the deed gets done — three things that plainly work together, or the opponent's entire account of karma collapses. Nāgārjuna asks whether the doer is fixed before he acts, or not fixed; whether the deed is settled before it is done, or unsettled. Both horns fail, and the chapter closes with the one positive statement the treatise permits itself here: the agent exists in dependence on the act, and the act in dependence on the agent, and there is nothing else to it.
問曰：現有作、有作者、有所用作法，三事和合故有果報，是故應有作者、作業。
答曰：上來品品中破一切法皆無有餘。如破三相，三相無故無有有為，有為無故無無為。有為無為無故，一切法盡無作、作者。若是有為，有為中已破。若是無為，無為中已破。不應復問。汝著心深故而復更問，今當復答。
Question: There plainly is an act, and an agent, and the means by which the act is done; and because these three come together there is a ripened result. So there must be an agent and an act.
Answer: In the chapters up to this point all things have been broken without remainder. Take the breaking of the three marks: since the three marks do not exist there are no conditioned things, and since there are no conditioned things there is no unconditioned. And since neither the conditioned nor the unconditioned exists, in all things whatsoever there is no act and no agent. If the act were conditioned, it has already been broken among conditioned things; if unconditioned, it has already been broken among the unconditioned. You ought not to ask again. But since your clinging mind runs deep and you ask once more, an answer will now be given again.
決定有作者， 不作決定業；
決定無作者， 不作無定業。
An agent who definitely exists
does not perform an act that definitely exists;
an agent who definitely does not exist
does not perform an act that does not exist.
若先定有作者、定有作業，則不應作。若先定無作者、定無作業，亦不應作。何以故？
If there is definitely an agent beforehand and definitely an act, then no acting should take place. And if there is definitely no agent beforehand and definitely no act, then no acting should take place either. Why?
決定業無作， 是業無作者；
定作者無作， 作者亦無業。
An act that definitely exists involves no doing,
and that act has no agent;
an agent who definitely exists does no doing,
and that agent has no act.
若先決定有作業，不應更有作者；又離作者應有作業。但是事不然。若先決定有作者，不應更有作業；又離作業應有作者。但是事不然。是故決定作者、決定作業，不應有作。不決定作者、不決定作業，亦不應有作。何以故？本來無故。有作者、有作業尚不能作，何況無作者、無作業。復次：
If there is definitely an act beforehand, no agent is needed besides; and there would be an act quite apart from any agent. But that will not do. If there is definitely an agent beforehand, no act is needed besides; and there would be an agent quite apart from any act. But that will not do. Therefore with a definite agent and a definite act there can be no acting. And with an indefinite agent and an indefinite act there can be no acting either. Why? Because there is nothing there to begin with. If acting is impossible even where there is an agent and an act, how much more where there is neither. Furthermore:
若定有作者， 亦定有作業，
作者及作業， 即墮於無因。
If there definitely is an agent
and definitely is an act,
then agent and act alike
fall into having no cause at all.
若先定有作者、定有作業，汝謂作者有作，即為無因，離作業有作者、離作者有作業，則不從因緣有。
問曰：若不從因緣有作者、有作業，有何咎？
答曰：
If there is definitely an agent beforehand and definitely an act, and you still say the agent does the acting, then it is causeless: there is an agent apart from the act and an act apart from the agent, and so neither comes about through causes and conditions.
Question: If agent and act do not come about through causes and conditions, what is wrong with that?
Answer:
若墮於無因， 則無因無果，
無作無作者， 無所用作法。
若無作等法， 則無有罪福，
罪福等無故， 罪福報亦無。
若無罪福報， 亦無有涅槃，
諸可有所作， 皆空無有果。
If one falls into having no cause,
then there is no cause and no fruit,
no act and no agent,
and no means by which an act is done.
And if there are no such things as acting,
then there is no wrongdoing and no merit;
and since wrongdoing and merit are absent,
their ripening is absent too.
And if wrongdoing and merit do not ripen,
then there is no nirvāṇa either;
whatever might be done
is void, and bears no fruit.
若墮於無因，一切法則無因無果。能生法名為因、所生法名為果，是二即無。是二無故，無作、無作者亦無所用作法，亦無罪福。罪福無故，亦無罪福果報及涅槃道。是故不得從無因生。
問曰：若作者不定，而作不定業，有何咎？
答曰：一事無尚不能起作業，何況二事都無。譬如化人以虛空為舍，但有言說，而無作者、作業。
問曰：若無作者、無作業，不能有所作；今有作者、有作業，應有作。
答曰：
If one falls into having no cause, then all things are without cause and without fruit. What is able to produce is called the cause, and what is produced is called the fruit — and both are then absent. And since both are absent, there is no act, no agent, and no means by which an act is done, and no wrongdoing or merit either. And since there is no wrongdoing or merit, there is no ripening of wrongdoing and merit, and no path to nirvāṇa. Nothing, therefore, can arise without a cause.
Question: If an agent who is not fixed performs an act that is not fixed, what is wrong with that?
Answer: Where even one of the two is absent no act can be set going — how much more when both are absent altogether. It would be like a conjured man building a house out of empty space: there are words for it, but no agent and no act.
Question: If there is no agent and no act, nothing can be done. But there is an agent and there is an act, and so there must be acting.
Answer:
作者定不定， 不能作二業，
有無相違故， 一處則無二。
An agent both fixed and unfixed
cannot perform the two kinds of act;
since existing and not existing contradict each other,
the two are not in one place.
作者定不定，不能作定不定業。何以故？有無相違故，一處不應有二。有是決定、無是不決定，一人一事云何有有無？復次：
An agent both fixed and unfixed cannot perform an act that is both fixed and unfixed. Why? Because existing and not existing contradict each other, and the two ought not to be in one place. Existing is the fixed and not existing is the unfixed: how could one person, in one affair, be both existent and non-existent? Furthermore:
有不能作無， 無不能作有，
若有作作者， 其過如先說。
What exists cannot make what does not,
what does not exist cannot make what does;
and if there is an agent who acts,
the fault is as already stated.
若有作者而無業，何能有所作？若無作者而有業，亦不能有所作。何以故？如先說。有中若先有業，作者復何所作？若先無業，云何可得作？如是則破罪福等因緣果報。是故偈中說「有不能作無，無不能作有，若有作作者，其過如先說。」復次：
If there is an agent but no act, what could possibly be done? And if there is no agent but there is an act, nothing can be done either. Why? As stated before. On the side of existence, if the act is already there, what is left for the agent to do? And if the act is not there beforehand, how could it be done at all? In this way the causes, conditions, and ripened results of wrongdoing and merit are broken. This is why the verse says: "What exists cannot make what does not, what does not exist cannot make what does; and if there is an agent who acts, the fault is as already stated." Furthermore:
作者不作定， 亦不作不定，
及定不定業， 其過如先說。
The agent does not perform the fixed act,
nor does he perform the unfixed act,
nor the act both fixed and unfixed:
the fault is as already stated.
定業已破，不定業亦破，定不定業亦破；今欲一時總破，故說是偈，是故作者不能作三種業。今三種作者，亦不能作業。何以故？
The fixed act has been broken, the unfixed act has been broken, and the act both fixed and unfixed has been broken. Now, wishing to break them all at one stroke, this verse is given: the agent cannot perform any of the three kinds of act. And the three kinds of agent cannot perform an act either. Why?
作者定不定、 亦定亦不定，
不能作於業， 其過如先說。
An agent fixed, or unfixed,
or both fixed and unfixed,
cannot perform an act:
the fault is as already stated.
作者定、不定、亦定亦不定，不能作於業。何以故？如先三種過因緣。此中應廣說，如是一切處求作者作業，皆不可得。
問曰：若言無作、無作者，則復墮無因。
答曰：是業從眾緣生，假名為有，無有決定。不如汝所說。何以故？
An agent fixed, or unfixed, or both fixed and unfixed cannot perform an act. Why? For the same three sorts of fault as before, which should be set out here at length. Searching in this way everywhere, neither agent nor act can be found.
Question: If you say there is no act and no agent, then you fall back into having no cause at all.
Answer: The act arises from a host of conditions and exists as a mere designation; it is not fixed. It is not as you say. Why?
因業有作者， 因作者有業，
成業義如是， 更無有餘事。
In dependence on the act there is an agent,
in dependence on the agent there is an act;
this is how action is established,
and there is nothing else to it.
業先無決定，因人起業；因業有作者，作者亦無決定。因有作業，名為作者，二事和合故得成作、作者。若從和合生則無自性，無自性故空，空則無所生。但隨凡夫憶想分別故，說有作業有作者；第一義中無作業、無作者。復次：
The act is not fixed beforehand; it is in dependence on a person that an act is set going. And in dependence on the act there is an agent, and the agent is not fixed either: it is because there is an act being done that he is called an agent. It is by the coming together of the two that acting and agent are established. And what arises from a coming-together has no inherent nature; having no inherent nature it is empty; and being empty, it produces nothing. It is only in accordance with the memories and discriminations of ordinary people that one speaks of an act and an agent; in the ultimate truth there is no act and no agent. Furthermore:
如破作作者， 受受者亦爾，
及一切諸法， 亦應如是破。
As act and agent have been broken,
so too the appropriated and its appropriator,
and all things whatsoever
should be broken in the same way.
如作、作者不得相離，不相離故不決定，無決定故無自性。受受者亦如是，受名五陰身，受者是人，如是離人無五陰、離五陰無人，但從眾緣生如受受者。餘一切法亦應如是破。
Just as act and agent cannot be separated from each other, and being inseparable are not fixed, and not being fixed have no inherent nature — so it is with the appropriated and the one who appropriates it. "The appropriated" means the body of the five aggregates, and "the appropriator" is the person. And thus apart from the person there are no five aggregates, and apart from the five aggregates there is no person: they arise merely from a host of conditions, like the appropriated and its appropriator. All other things should be broken in this same way.
Everything in this chapter turns on the word 決定 — fixed, settled, determinate. It is worth being precise about what is being denied, because a reader can lose the thread here and conclude that Nāgārjuna has just abolished responsibility, which is the opposite of what the text says.
The opponent wants an agent who is already fully an agent before he acts. Nāgārjuna's reply is that such a person would have nothing to do. If you are constituted as a doer independently of any deed, then the deed adds nothing to you; and if the deed is likewise settled in advance, it does not need you. Two finished items sitting side by side do not amount to an action — if the act is already there, what is left for the agent to do? And the other horn is worse: an unfixed agent and an unfixed act is nothing at all working on nothing at all. Piṅgala's image is one of the best in the treatise, a conjured man building a house out of empty space. Every noun in the sentence is in place. Nothing has been built.
Notice where Piṅgala plants his warning, though, because it is the same guardrail as in Chapter 1 and Chapter 7. Verses 4 through 6 are not Nāgārjuna's position; they are the catastrophe he is refusing. Without causes there is no ripening; without ripening there is no wrongdoing and no merit; without those there is no nirvāṇa and nothing worth doing. He states all of that as an unacceptable consequence — 是故不得從無因生, nothing can arise without a cause. Emptiness is not the denial of moral causation. It is the denial that the agent and the act are two independent things.
Verse 11 is the payoff and the closest thing to a positive doctrine in these three chapters: in dependence on the act there is an agent, in dependence on the agent there is an act, and there is nothing else to it. Not "there is no agent." There is an agent — one constituted by acting, whose reality is exhausted by the relationship, with no further self standing behind the deeds owning them. This is why karma survives emptiness rather than being destroyed by it: what ripens is a process, not a proprietor.
And then the final verse widens the frame one last time, to the pair that has been the real subject all along: 受 and 受者, the appropriated and the one who appropriates — the five aggregates and the person who takes them up as "mine." Apart from the person there are no aggregates; apart from the aggregates there is no person. Every argument of these three chapters has been rehearsal for that sentence. Defilement and the defiled, act and agent, arising and what arises: each was the same knot, tied in easier material, so that when it appears in the material we care about most we would already know what to do with it.
Key Terms
| Term | Chinese | What it means here |
|---|---|---|
| Defilement / the defiled one | 染／染者 | An attribute and the person who bears it. Chapter 6's test case for every attribute-and-bearer pair in the treatise; craving stands here for all the afflictions. |
| The three marks | 三相 | Arising, abiding, ceasing (生・住・滅) — the Abhidharma's definition of what makes a thing conditioned, and therefore real rather than merely named. |
| Conditioned / unconditioned | 有為／無為 | Saṃskṛta and asaṃskṛta. Chapter 7 ends by showing they stand or fall together: the unconditioned is defined only as the absence of the three marks. |
| Root arising / arising-of-arising | 本生／生生 | The Sarvāstivāda device for stopping the infinite regress: a secondary arising that produces the primary one, which in turn produces it. Verses 5–8 dismantle the loop. |
| Quiescence | 寂滅 | Still, quenched, at rest. In verse 17 not a state a thing attains but what a dependently produced thing already is: no this, no that, no mark, words cut off. |
| City of the gandharvas | 乾闥婆城 | The mirage-city of celestial musicians seen on the horizon at sunrise. With illusion and dream, one of the three standard images for an appearance that is genuinely seen and has nothing behind it. |
| Act / agent | 作／作者 | Karman and kāraka. Established only in mutual dependence — which is how karma survives emptiness: what ripens is a process, not a proprietor. |
| The appropriated / the appropriator | 受／受者 | Upādāna and upādātṛ — the five aggregates taken up as "mine," and the person who takes them up. Chapter 8's last verse, and the real target of all three chapters. |
| Mere designation | 假名 | What exists by being named in dependence on conditions, with no fixed nature of its own. The status Nāgārjuna grants to acts, agents, and everything else. |