Pramāṇayuktanidhi, Part One: Establishing the Knowable

Jamtsho’s critical edition gives the Sanskrit as Pramāṇayuktinidhi; the Tibetan text’s transliteration of the Sanskrit title reads -yukta-. ↩︎

The auto-commentary does not comment on the four opening verses. The exegetical tradition takes the guru to be Sakya Paṇḍita’s uncle and teacher Drakpa Gyaltsen (གྲགས་པ་རྒྱལ་མཚན་), and Sangye Pal’s commentary says so explicitly. ↩︎

Jamtsho reads this as homage to Dignāga and Dharmakīrti, the founders of Buddhist epistemology, praised through the figure of the Nāga king: his jewelled crown is their intellect set with qualities, the phuṭ of his tongue their teaching of the two truths and emptiness, his unbearable gaze their wisdom and compassion, and his place as ornament of the ocean their place among the learned. ↩︎

དཔལ་ལྡན་གྲགས་པ་: Jamtsho reads “the Glorious One [Dignāga] and Dharmakīrti”. Sakya Paṇḍita names none of the star-like scholars. Ngawang Chodrak identifies them as Ngok Lotsawa, Cha-ba Chökyi Sengge and Tsangnakpa Tsöndrü Sengge; Uyukpa Rigpé Sengge, the earliest commentator, as the early translators Kawa Paltsek and Chokro Lü’i Gyaltsen. ↩︎

Rongtön Sheja Kunrig reads བློ་ here as valid cognition: whatever is an object is established by valid cognition. ↩︎

The opponents in this exchange are the early Tibetan logicians, notably Cha-ba, who held the conceptual generality and the non-existent appearance (hairs seen with an eye disease, a double moon) to be real apprehended objects (Sodargye). Sakya Paṇḍita attributes a similar view to the Hearer (Śrāvaka) schools, and Gorampa traces the Tibetan idea back to Dharmottara. Jamtsho thinks the arguments are most likely aimed at Tsurtön Zhönnu Sengge, whose commentary carries the same threefold list. ↩︎

Sanskrit arthasāmānya. ↩︎

Sanskrit: object of comprehension, prameya; specifically characterised phenomenon, svalakṣaṇa. ↩︎

Dignāga’s twofold division is made by the mode of apprehension: non-conceptual cognition apprehends only the specifically characterised phenomenon, conceptual cognition the generally characterised (Sodargye). ↩︎

Sanskrit sāmānyalakṣaṇa. ↩︎

Sodargye identifies these objectors as the early Tibetan logicians. ↩︎

The commentaries do not name these scholars. The objection runs two systems together: the apprehended object belongs to the Sautrāntika account, where external objects are granted, and its denial to the Chittamatra account. The summary verse that closes the chapter gives the answer. ↩︎

Sodargye identifies the schools: intrinsic nature, the Charvakas; Īśvara, the followers of Maheśvara; primal substance, the Sāṃkhyas; atoms, the Vaiśeṣikas and the Buddhist Vaibhāṣikas and Sautrāntikas; cognisance, Chittamatra; dependent arising, Madhyamaka. ↩︎

Their argument: consciousness is immaterial and so cannot be obstructed; if it were the seer, one would see through walls. Since obstruction blocks sight, the material faculty must be what sees (Sodargye). Jamtsho traces the view to Abhidharmakośa I.42ab. In the auto-commentary’s outline, this verse and the next refute other views before the Sautrāntika position is stated. ↩︎

The early Tibetan logicians. Sodargye notes that they drop the Vaibhāṣika claim that the faculty sees but keep the simultaneity of object and cognition. Jamtsho names Cha-ba, for whom subject and object must be simultaneous if cognition is to reach its object at all. ↩︎

Sanskrit manaskāra. ↩︎

Sakya Paṇḍita here states his own position within the Sautrāntika system, which he calls the system of the object knower (དོན་རིག་). Sodargye explains the object’s “two results” as the continuation of its own kind and the cognition that bears its form. The mind’s “two aspects” are, in the auto-commentary, the cognition that knows the object and the self-awareness that knows that cognition; Gorampa takes them as the objective aspect and the subjective aspect. ↩︎

With this verse Sakya Paṇḍita moves from the Sautrāntika to the Chittamatra system. In the Entrance Gate for the Wise (མཁས་པ་རྣམས་འཇུག་པའི་སྒོ་) he warns that reading “neither one nor many” here as a Madhyamaka argument mistakes the context: here it is a Chittamatra reasoning. ↩︎

Neither Sakya Paṇḍita nor his commentators name the target. Sodargye describes early logicians who proposed settling conventions in Candrakīrti’s Prāsaṅgika way, accepting what the world accepts without analysis. Jamtsho points to Cha-ba’s remark that double moons and conceptual generalities “abide as they are renowned in the world” as the kind of view under attack. ↩︎

Sanskrit sahopalambha. ↩︎

The auto-commentary gives two separate proofs that all knowables are mind. Clarity: the defining characteristic of cognition is to be clear and aware, and nothing knowable lacks it, so everything knowable is established as mind, just as a hump and dewlap establish a cow. Co-apprehension: whatever is invariably apprehended together (ལྷན་ཅིག་དམིགས་ངེས་; the root drops ངེས་) is not different, like the appearance of two moons, and blue and the cognition that apprehends it are invariably apprehended together. སྔོ་འཛིན་ is therefore the pair “blue and its apprehender”, not “the apprehension of blue”. The auto-commentary calls this an observation of something contradictory to the pervader: being different is pervaded by being different substances at different times, and invariable co-apprehension contradicts that. The last line gives the negative pervasion (ལྡོག་ཁྱབ་), that co-apprehension never occurs in the dissimilar class (མི་མཐུན་ཕྱོགས་) of different things. The auto-commentary takes the alternatives in turn. Different things at different times are apprehended at different times, so they are not co-apprehended. A superimposition at the same time is known to be a superimposition, so its object is nothing other than the cognition. Different substances at the same time are ruled out by an invalidating reason (གནོད་པ་ཅན་གྱི་རྟགས་): what is unrelated is not invariably apprehended together, like blue and yellow. Jamyang Loter Wangpo’s commentary (tr. Roger Espel Llima) reads the last line differently, as a quoted counterargument, “different [things] have different scopes”, which refutes being substantially different on two grounds: different entities are apprehended separately and at different times, and an invalidating reason applies to simultaneous ones. The substance matches the auto-commentary; the two part over whether མཐའ་གཞན་ means “the alternatives” or “different scopes”. ↩︎

Sanskrit avayavin. ↩︎

The Mādhyamika turns the “neither one nor many” reasoning back on the idealist’s partless moment of cognition. Sodargye notes that Sakya Paṇḍita answers while provisionally standing within the Chittamatra position. The next verse completes the reply: atoms are surrounded by other atoms at the same time, but the three times never arise together. ↩︎

Sanskrit vāsanā. ↩︎

Sakya Paṇḍita’s answer to how idealism can tell true from false without external objects: what most beings perceive through stable, enduring traces counts conventionally as correct, and what is perceived through unstable, temporary traces as incorrect, as with one moon and two (Sodargye). ↩︎

This answers the objection “some declare” above. As Gorampa’s verse closing the chapter puts it, external apprehended objects belong to the Sautrāntika system, and the proponents of cognition-only have no account of apprehended objects. Sodargye ranks the positions: Sautrāntika as less definitive, Chittamatra as provisionally definitive, Madhyamaka as fully definitive. ↩︎

Sanskrit buddhi. ↩︎

The auto-commentary rejects the definition of mind as what knows an object. Chapter 1 defined the object as what is cognisable by the mind, so each would depend on the other and neither could be identified; and self-awareness, which has no object other than itself, would not count as cognition. Lowo Khenchen names Tsangnakpa and others as holding that definition. ↩︎

Sanskrit svasaṃvedana or svasaṃvitti. ↩︎

The auto-commentary spells out “and so forth”: by object, mind is conceptual or non-conceptual; by the nature of cognition, mistaken or non-mistaken; by mode of engagement, as with cutting wood, it has not engaged its object, is engaging it, or has engaged it. Gathered from the side of the subject, all of these are included in self-awareness. ↩︎

The auto-commentary names them “most Tibetan scholars, Cha-ba and others”; Sodargye adds Tsangnakpa. Lowo Khenchen traces the wording of the opponents’ definitions in this chapter to Tsurtön Zhönnu Sengge’s Lamp of Wisdom on Valid Cognition (ཚད་མ་ཤེས་རབ་སྒྲོན་མེ་). Sakya Paṇḍita accepts the last two of the five and refutes the first three. ↩︎

Sanskrit manaḥparīkṣa. ↩︎

The opponents define correct assumption as an awareness that, without depending on a reason, ascertains a previously unrealised concealed object in accordance with the fact. They divide it into three: without a reason (thinking there is water in one’s forefathers’ old well); with an inverted reason (concluding there is fire from the flies gathered round the smell of burnt meat); and with an unascertained reason (realising that sound is impermanent from the reason ‘produced’ without knowing the three-fold criteria) (auto-commentary). The “two [kinds] that have a reason” below are the second and third. ↩︎

Sanskrit pramāṇa. ↩︎

The Kabum text reads དེས་ཀྱང་ (“even by that”). Jamtsho’s critical edition reads ངེས་ཀྱང་ (“though it ascertains”), as does the auto-commentary, and the translation follows it. The auto-commentary cites the Pramāṇavārttika: with regard to one object, the two minds of certainty and superimposition are by nature refuted and refuter. ↩︎

Sodargye identifies the speakers as the earlier Tibetan tradition. Their example in the auto-commentary: thinking ‘Is there water in the well?’ is correct assumption, thinking ‘Is there none?’ is wrong cognition, and holding both is doubt. The reply: if the one wavering is split between correct assumption and wrong cognition, no doubt can be found. ↩︎

Wrong correct assumption would ascertain a concealed object not in accordance with the fact. If it is admitted, it is a sixth invalid cognition, and the five are no longer a definitive enumeration (auto-commentary). ↩︎

The auto-commentary: then every conjecture, such as guessing that there is a treasure of jewels under one’s house, would be true. Nor is the old well a case without a reason: having once seen water there serves as one, and since that reason is uncertain, [the cognition] is doubt. Sodargye reports Gorampa making the same point. ↩︎

On this view every uncertain reason (proving sound impermanent because it is audible, or because it is an object of comprehension) would yield correct assumption, yet the master classes such cognitions as doubt; and so would every non-established reason (sound is impermanent because it is visible), yet the treatises say a non-established reason produces no realisation (auto-commentary). ↩︎

This answers the view that the wisdom arising from hearing scripture is correct assumption. In the auto-commentary, scripture backed by proof, such as the teaching of the four truths and the two kinds of selflessness, gives valid cognition; scripture with a refuter, such as the claim that bathing and austerities cleanse wrongdoing, gives wrong cognition; scripture with neither proof nor refuter gives doubt where its basis is established and non-realisation where it is not. ↩︎

The opponents define appearance-without-ascertainment as the appearing of a specifically characterised object, such as blue, that does not contradict the superimposition ’not blue’; their three kinds are where the object’s aspect is unclear, where the mind is not directed to it, and where a cause of error intervenes (auto-commentary). Sakya Paṇḍita’s point, supported in the auto-commentary by a commentary on the Pramāṇavārttika, is that direct perception never holds its object by ascertaining it, only by its appearing. ↩︎

The auto-commentary: subsequent cognition is non-realisation, since the object of valid cognition ceases moment by moment and, even had it not, the mind has already realised it. Taking what is realised now to be the very thing realised before is wrong cognition, since it holds as that what is not that. Inferring past experience from present memory is the Yogācāras’ proof of the result. ↩︎

The target is the opponents’ “perceptual subsequent cognition”, such as seeing the same blue just after seeing blue (auto-commentary). The auto-commentary sets out the contrast: direct perception is free from conceptual construction in nature, has the specifically characterised as its object and the present as its time, and apprehends clearly and unmixed; subsequent cognition is conceptual, has the word-object as its object and the past as its time, and apprehends unclearly and mixed. Answering a later objection by the Karmapa Chödrak Gyatso, Sodargye notes that the analysis of objects here stands on the Sautrāntika position. ↩︎

Sodargye identifies the speakers as the earlier Tibetan tradition. The auto-commentary asks what the class is: a string of moments of blue, which is a substance and not a class; the universal of the non-Buddhists, which is impossible; or an elimination of other, which is superimposed and not an entity. None of these is an object of the senses. It takes the ensuing cognition to be certainty or memory, both conceptual. ↩︎

Sanskrit jātisantāna. ↩︎

The first blue and the later blue are alike in being a previously unseen specifically characterised object seen by an unmistaken cognition, so either both are valid cognition or neither is (auto-commentary). ↩︎

This answers the objection that if direct perception is confined to the substance of a single moment, ordinary beings could have no valid direct perception (auto-commentary). Their direct perception does not engage individual atoms: it is the consciousness produced over however many moments by an object made of gathered atoms, a sense faculty, mental engagement and so on. ↩︎

Aimed at the fivefold list. Setting up separate classes of mind on the strength of some minor feature would undo every definitive enumeration in Dharmakīrti’s system, of valid and invalid cognition and of invalid reasons, as if adventitious inference were not included in inference (auto-commentary). ↩︎

The auto-commentary defends the negative form: just as ’not an ox’ is marked out by ruling out the hump and dewlap, there is no fault in defining it this way. ↩︎

Sakya Paṇḍita’s own position. The auto-commentary matches the three to the three faults of a reason: a non-established reason has no power to produce realisation, and non-realisation engages neither rightly nor wrongly; an uncertain reason produces wavering, as doubt does; a contradictory reason proves the unwanted, as wrong conception realises what is not so. Stated reasons are only four, one of them faultless, and in the same way a mind’s modes of engagement are only four, one of them valid; so invalid cognition is definitively three. By nature, wrong conception and doubt are themselves non-realisation. ↩︎

The auto-commentary’s examples: not engaged, as with one who knows no logic and has never turned to the three-fold criteria; not completed, as with one who, asked whether sound is permanent, has begun to examine it; completed yet not found, in three ways: where there is no object to realise, as with subsequent cognition; where the realising mind is corrupted, as with momentariness, not realised from the side of elimination of other; and where it is not an object of knowledge, as with things remote in place, time or nature. ↩︎

The five (auto-commentary). Non-conceptual: a corrupted sense consciousness, as when seeing two moons, and a corrupted mental consciousness, as in a dream. Conceptual: error about aspect, as with a rope taken for a snake; about time, as when thinking the present blue is the past blue, which is what gets counted as subsequent cognition; and about the object, as when thinking this śiṃśapā and sandalwood share one universal. ↩︎

Manifest doubt is actually engaged, as when wondering whether a fire offering wins a higher rebirth or not; dormant doubt is like a seed in a box, with potency once it meets conditions. The auto-commentary places under it every uncertain reason and correct assumption: in short, a mind that engages a concealed object without depending on a reason is, on examination, doubt, whether its content is true or false. Sodargye takes the second pair as a division of manifest doubt. ↩︎

Under the enumeration verse above, the auto-commentary says that both valid cognitions are included in self-awareness direct perception, just as both objects are included in the specifically characterised object of comprehension. Śākya Chokden gives the reason: the direct object of comprehension of both valid cognitions is cognition itself. ↩︎

Sanskrit sāmānya. ↩︎

The auto-commentary sorts the chapter’s terms into two sets of synonyms. Specifically characterised phenomenon, instance (གསལ་བ་), entity, substance, the distinguished (ལོག་པ་) and the ultimate name what can perform a function, stays unmixed with other substances, stands as cause and effect, and is what every person engages when taking up and setting aside. Universal, generally characterised phenomenon, elimination of other, distinguisher, preclusion, the mixed, relationship and the relative name what does not abide in the object, is not established as an entity, is not an object of the senses, is superimposed by conceptual cognition, and cannot perform a function. ↩︎

Sanskrit anyāpoha. ↩︎

The auto-commentary names the others as the Tibetans: sometimes they explain substance and affirmation, universal and distinguisher, as alike, sometimes as not; sometimes as phenomena of the mind, sometimes of the object; sometimes they prove the universal, sometimes refute it, so that “I have not seen their thinking reach the bottom”. Śākya Chokden counts Tsangnakpa among them. Sakya Paṇḍita’s own allocation: substance and universal are the objects, the conceptual and the non-conceptual the minds, and appearance and exclusion the modes of apprehension. ↩︎

Sanskrit: inference, anumāna; exclusion, apoha. ↩︎

Jamtsho’s critical edition reads གྲུབ་ (“established”) with a single witness, as does the Kabum text. The other witnesses and the auto-commentary have སྒྲུབ་ or a variant spelling of it (“prove”), which would give “inference is held to prove [its object] by way of the distinguisher”. ↩︎

The auto-commentary first refutes the Tibetans’ definitions: substance is many distinguishers gathered inseparably on one basis, and a distinguisher is each gathered property taken separately, “like a coat of mail and its plates”. But distinguishers are superimposed by the mind and do not abide in the object, so there is nothing there to gather; if they did gather, this would be no different from the non-Buddhists’ many parts gathered inseparably in a single whole; and each definition depends on the other. Jamtsho finds a very similar passage, coat of mail included, in Tsurtön Zhönnu Sengge’s Lamp of Wisdom on Valid Cognition, which Sakya Paṇḍita is probably quoting or paraphrasing. The verse then refutes the substantial phenomenon: if inference measured substantial phenomena, then, since produced and impermanent are not different substances in a vase, realising that it is produced would be realising that it is impermanent. ↩︎

Sakya Paṇḍita’s own definitions. In the auto-commentary, the universal is a superimposition appearing as a single distinguisher, turned away from the dissimilar class: to a conceptual cognition apprehending a vase, the instances of vase appear as turned away from non-vase. The particular is that same [superimposition], turned away also from within the similar class and appearing as two distinguishers together: to a conceptual cognition apprehending a tree, what appears as a śiṃśapā. Both are superimpositions. Jamtsho finds a very similar definition in Tsurtön’s Lamp of Wisdom. ↩︎

The auto-commentary: śiṃśapā, sandalwood and the like, different substances gathered by direction, are horizontal particulars, and the universal related to them is the horizontal universal; the earlier and later moments of a single entity such as a śiṃśapā, gathered by time, are vertical particulars, and the universal related to them is the vertical universal. Horizontal particulars depend on direction, so they are different substances. Vertical particulars depend on time, and since the present is an entity while past and future are not, only their being one is negated. Śākya Chokden, approving Terawa (known as the new Dignāga), says the pair is not Sakya Paṇḍita’s own system, since the terms occur nowhere in the works of Dignāga and Dharmakīrti: it is a Naiyāyika view reported in the Ornament of Valid Cognition (ཚད་མ་རྒྱན་), set out here in passing. Terawa himself says the Vaiśeṣikas coined the two terms. The image is literal. ཐད་ཀ is “level, side by side”: things that exist together in different places lie along one line. གོང་མ is “upper”, and in Tibetan what is above is also what is earlier, so the moments of one thing are stacked one on another. Jamtsho gives the Sanskrit as tiryaksāmānya and ūrdhvatā, and Monier-Williams glosses tiryañc “horizontal (opposed to ūrdhva)”. Sodargye’s Chinese has 异体 “distinct-substance” and 先后 “successive”, glosses drawn from the commentary. ↩︎

The auto-commentary identifies them as the non-Buddhist Vaiśeṣikas. Their great universal, existence, and limited universals such as cowness pervade all their instances and are different substances from them: permanent, partless and non-appearing, and joined to the instances by the relationship of inherence, “like a herd of oxen tied to one rope”. ↩︎

The reasoning is the nonapprehension of that which should appear. The auto-commentary: a universal other than instances such as [particular] trees is not established as an entity, since it is not observed although it should appear, like a rabbit’s horns; to be certain that something exists even though it could not appear would go much too far. ↩︎

The auto-commentary names two parties. The Sāṃkhyas hold that the universal, primal substance (the three guṇas in equal balance), is present in particulars such as a vase as a single self, like fire and its heat. The Tibetans proclaim with one voice that a “mere tree” over śiṃśapā, sandalwood and the like, a “mere blue” over beryl and other blues, and a “mere ox” are one with their particulars, indivisible in substance and nature: “the Sāṃkhyas who hold this and the Tibetans agree in meaning”. Śākya Chokden says that from Cha-ba and Tsangnakpa to his own day all have agreed on this. The auto-commentary divides the one-substance view into three: one universal one with many particulars (refuted in the next five verses), many universals one with many particulars, and a universal of similarity. ↩︎

Since universal and particular are one substance, when the particular appears, the universal, indivisible from it, should appear too; its nonapprehension refutes it (auto-commentary). ↩︎

The auto-commentary: when one tree arises or perishes, if the tree-universal does not arise or perish, they are not one substance; if it does, trees of different places would arise in one place, trees of different times at one time and trees of different aspects in one aspect, and when one perished all would perish. It cites the Pramāṇaviniścaya: things differ only by having contradictory properties or different causes, and if that does not make them different, nothing differs from anything and everything becomes a single substance. ↩︎

The arguments by which [Buddhists] refute a single whole pervading head, legs and the other parts (that what is related to many is not one; that when the hand moved the whole body would move; and those from being covered or uncovered, dyed or undyed) apply equally to a single universal (auto-commentary). Sodargye notes that the charge bites only on Buddhists, since a Sāṃkhya never refuted the whole: its target is the Tibetans. ↩︎

A single substance has no part that appears and part that does not, so when the particular appears to a sense consciousness, the universal appears too, and that consciousness becomes conceptual (auto-commentary). To the reply that apprehending a conceptual generality is conceptual but apprehending a type-universal is not, the auto-commentary answers that to hold a type-universal not included in the conceptual generality is like holding an ocean that is not water: “the babble of one drunk on a bad teacher’s poison-water”. ↩︎

Different things such as white and blue, and contradictories such as light and darkness, would all be one substance. Then wanting blue one would get white, wanting darkness light, wanting the universal the particular, and everything would fall into confusion (auto-commentary). ↩︎

The auto-commentary says only “some”, who grant that there is no single universal but hold that on each particular, such as a śiṃśapā, there is a universal one in nature with it. Rongtön attributes the view to “some Tibetans” (བོད་འགའ་ཞིག་). ↩︎

If there are many universals, the universal of śiṃśapā is a collection of two distinguishers, which makes it a particular, and the definition of the universal is not established. And establishing the particular śiṃśapā would not establish the universal of other trees, nor would excluding the universal of śiṃśapā exclude other trees, so the system of negation and affirmation collapses (auto-commentary). ↩︎

In the auto-commentary, “some” accept neither one universal nor many, but hold that the universal in which śiṃśapā, sandalwood and the like are similar in definition, having branches and leaves, is one substance with the particulars. Śākya Chokden attributes the view to Tsangnakpa Tsöndrü Sengge; Sodargye, to the early Tibetan school of pramāṇa. ↩︎

Putting resemblances together is conceptual cognition, so resemblance does not exist in the object. If it did, on seeing a ruby never seen before one would have to think that it resembles other rubies (auto-commentary). The auto-commentary cites the Pramāṇavārttika: those who apprehend resemblance are those who have seen both what resembles and what it resembles. ↩︎

The Kabum text and the auto-commentary read རྟོགས་ (“realised”). Jamtsho’s critical edition reads རྟོག་ (“conceived”) and records no variant; the translation follows it. ↩︎

The auto-commentary first reports a fallback: “Even if there is no similar universal in the object, why should there not be a universal that conceptual cognition apprehends as similar?” Śākya Chokden attributes it to Denbakpa Mawé Sengge, a disciple of Cha-ba. The answer: the word “similar” already indicates many phenomena, since a single phenomenon cannot be similar to that same one. To the further claim that apprehending as similar is itself the universal, even if nothing appears as one, the auto-commentary replies that one could no longer say “bring wood”, only “bring something like śiṃśapā, bring something like sandalwood”. ↩︎

Because of differences of place, time and aspect, resemblance in every respect is nowhere possible. So pervasion too is not established through the resemblance of the smoke on the mountain pass and the smoke in the kitchen, but by conceiving them as one universal through elimination of other (auto-commentary). ↩︎

Jamtsho’s critical edition adopts འགྱུར་ (“would contradict”) from one witness. The Kabum text, the auto-commentary and his other witnesses read སྣང་ (“appear”), which the translation keeps. ↩︎

The auto-commentary answers from Dharmakīrti, quoting the Pramāṇavārttika: the mind of a universal is corrupted by a cause of error; the universal that is the word-object is imputed by conceptual cognition; the universal of impermanence and the like is a non-entity, and so not the sphere of the senses. Sodargye takes the King of Reasoning to be Dignāga and Dharmakīrti together. ↩︎

Sakya Paṇḍita’s own position. Conceptual cognition, mistaken by nature, takes the universal and particular of elimination of other for the universal and particular of the object; on that [mistake] rests the system in which establishing the particular establishes the universal and excluding the universal excludes the particular (auto-commentary). ↩︎

The auto-commentary spells out what would collapse: the reasoning of identical nature, by which establishing the particular establishes the universal; the nonapprehension of the pervader, by which excluding the universal excludes the particular; and with them every logical system and all worldly activity. ↩︎

Conceptual cognition is mistaken by nature, so when it engages [its object] having mistaken elimination of other for the specifically characterised phenomenon, the mere attainment of the object accomplishes what valid cognition does. “Attainment” is just this: knowing, when one proceeds according to the negation or affirmation made, whether the object exists or not. Every other dispute resolves itself once elimination of other is understood, so none is stated here (auto-commentary). ↩︎

The Ulūka School is the Vaiśeṣika, named after its founder’s epithet Ulūka, “owl”. Those of the Land of Snow are Cha-ba and his successors (Sodargye). Gorampa explains why they count as followers of the Sāṃkhyas: they do not say outright that the universal is an entity, but accept that it is one substance with entities. He also records Sakya Paṇḍita’s quip that those of the Land of Snow (གངས་ཅན་པ་) agree with the Sāṃkhyas (གྲངས་ཅན་), and the Sakyapa is at odds with Kapila (སེར་སྐྱ་). ↩︎