Vimalamitra and Atiśa vs. Dignāga

In his commentary on the Heart sūtra (abbr. PHT), Vimalamitra criticizes Dignāga’s theory about the authenticity/reliability of the first reciter (saṃgītikartṛ), according to which a reciter is regarded as reliable if he expresses the four items: 1. teacher, 2. audiences as witnesses, 3. time, and 4. place. Among the two elements of criticism by Vimalamitra about this theory, the first is that the witness cannot fulfill his role because those who cannot visit the witness cannot obtain his testimony. A similar argument is also found in his commentary on the Perfection of Wisdom in 700 Stanzas (abbr. SPT). Atiśa’s commentary on the Heart Sūtra, which is a kind of sub-commentary to PHT, also includes this argument. However, one sentence therein seems to have a textual problem. While comparing the PHT and SPT, I tried to emend the text and read the sentence clearly. As such, this paper is the first to point out that the abovementioned dispute is cited in Jñānavajra’s commentary on the Laṅkāvatārasūtra, which is on the one hand a valid counter-criticism to Vimalamitra/Atiśa and on the other hand will serve as a support to my emendation of Atiśa’s text

Argument (complex analysis) · Art · Criticism · Epistemology · Linguistics · Literature · Perfection · Sentence · Witness · Indian and Buddhist Studies · Indian History and Philosophy · Philosophy · Religious, Philosophical, and Educational Studies