Master Gangxiao: The General Meaning of the *Hastavālaprakarana*, Part Two

The General Meaning of the Hastavālaprakarana, Part Two

As is our custom, let me begin with the title. This treatise is called the Mahāyāna-hastavālaprakarana. "Mahā" — great — is relative to "small." We live in a relative world, where everything is measured by comparison; to speak of "great" is to imply "small," to speak of "many" is to imply "few." "Yāna" means to carry, to convey. The Dharma is a vehicle that can carry sentient beings drowning in the cycle of birth and death across to the far shore of nirvana. Putting "Mahā" and "Yāna" together signals that the Dharma is especially exalted. In Buddhist terminology, this kind of compound is called karma-dhāraya (持业释).

What's a karma-dhāraya? In Buddhism we have what's known as the "Six Combinations" — 六离合 — which states that when a single Dharma carries two or more meanings, there are six ways to parse it. Here they are:

A. Karma-dhāraya (持业释). The compound has two meanings, but its underlying essence is one. "Mahāyāna" is a karma-dhāraya: although mahā and yāna each have their own sense, once combined they share a single essence.

B. Tat-puruṣa (依主释). The compound is built upon a primary referent that supports a dependent one. "Eye-consciousness" (眼识) is the classic case — the consciousness that arises depending on the eye. The eye is the basis; consciousness is what depends on it.

C. Dvandva (相违释). The two parts of the compound really do refer to different things, and both are packed in. "Teaching and contemplation" (教观) is a good example — teaching and contemplation are two entirely different matters.

D. Avyayībhāva (邻近释). Take the "Four Foundations of Mindfulness" (四念处). At its core, the Four Foundations of Mindfulness is wisdom, but the mindfulness associated with it is so strong it colors the whole compound.

E. Digu (带数释). Compound names built around a numeral: the Four Noble Truths (四谛), the Noble Eightfold Path (八正道), the Twelve Links of Dependent Origination (十二有支).

F. Bahuvrīhi (有财释). Taking another's name as one's own.

For a fuller treatment, see Master Ouyi's Explanations of the Six Combinations. The Six Combinations can also be approached from the angle of sutra translation, which I'll add briefly for you. Teacher Li tells me your program doesn't include a course on canonical translation, so this should be useful. The Six Combinations concern compound words. When two words are placed together to form a new one, six possibilities arise:

A. Tat-puruṣa (依主释). In Sanskrit, tatpurusa. The first part takes the second as its primary referent and exerts a qualifying function on it. The first part can show case inflection — genitive or dative — though a case ending isn't strictly required. Take "object of knowledge" (所知相), Sanskrit jñeya-lakṣaṇa. The first part, jñeya, carries genitive force and qualifies lakṣaṇa, yielding "the mark of that which is to be known."

B. Karma-dhāraya (持业释). In Sanskrit, Karmadhāraya. It's really an extension of tat-puruṣa. The first part qualifies the second in the same way, but no case inflection is required — both parts stand in the same case. Japanese grammarians simply call this a "same-case determinative compound." Take "Mahāyāna": mahā is "great," yāna is "vehicle." Together, a great vehicle capable of carrying many people to the destination. The first part modifies the second, but both stand in the same case — no inflection on the first relative to the second.

C. Digu (带数释). Sanskrit Dvigu. The word literally means "two oxen," extended here to mean compounds built around a numeral. Digu is really tat-puruṣa extended, with a numeral in the first slot qualifying the second. The Four Noble Truths, the Eightfold Path, the Twelve Links, the Three Realms (三界), the Seven Treasures (七宝) — all fit this pattern.

D. Dvandva (相违释). Sanskrit Dvandva, originally meaning "pair" or "couplet." The two parts sit side by side, equal in status, joined without any conjunction.

E. Bahuvrīhi (有财释). The original meaning is "many grains of millet." In old agricultural society, owning abundant grain meant wealth — a kind of magnate. From there the meaning extends to possession: the whole compound acts as an adjective modifying another noun, and that noun is what owns the attribute. Take Śiva in Indian mythology: he has three eyes, and in Sanskrit this is tri-locana, "three-eyed." On the surface it looks like digu, but the whole term actually means "the god who has three eyes." How is this different from digu? In digu, the first element — once joined with the second to form the compound — must agree with the modified noun in gender, number, and case.

F. Avyayībhāva (邻近释). An adverbial compound formed with an indeclinable. The first part must be an indeclinable — a word without inflectional endings — and the second part must be a noun.

Back to the title. Zhangzhong Lun is properly Hastavālaprakarana; rendered literally, "Elephant-Trunk, Elephant-Tail Treatise."

Why "Elephant-Trunk, Elephant-Tail Treatise"?

Because this treatise argues that everything we perceive can always be broken down into smaller and smaller parts — even into atoms. We can't actually perceive atoms, and they remain inconceivable, for no matter how small we imagine them, we can always imagine them as having parts still. So everything is ultimately just an imputed concept. "Elephant trunk, elephant tail" thus points to the fact that all the things of the world are only fragments of a larger whole — parts that look like an elephant's trunk or tail, but never the whole beast itself.

"Zhang" (掌) means palm. "Zhangzhong" (掌中) means to grasp something in hand — to have it firmly held. "Lun" (论) means discussion or treatise — but only the deliberations of sages and worthies count as lun; the chatter of ordinary people doesn't qualify. China's Analects (论语) is just such a collection: the discussions of Confucius and his students. In Buddhism, "lun" refers to one of the Three Baskets. Put together, "掌中论" tells us that although the Mahāyāna teachings are vast and complex, this treatise distills their essential outline — simple enough to master the whole. Once you grasp this treatise, the entire Mahāyāna teaching rests in your palm, ready to be arranged however you wish.

The author is Master Dignāga (陈那论师). About his life, plenty of material exists, though scattered across sources. The Great Tang Records on the Western Regions (《大唐西域记》) contains a passage; Master Yijing's A Record of the Buddhist Religion as Practised in India and the Malay Archipelago (《南海寄归内法传》) mentions him; Chinese and Tibetan traditions both preserve accounts, though they differ in details; Tāranātha's History of Buddhism in India (commonly called Tāranātha's Buddhist History) includes him, among others.

Dignāga lived around the fifth or sixth century. The "Chronological Table of Indian Buddhist Logicians" gives his birth as 425 CE. Mr. Ju Zonglin suggests a birth near 450 and a death in 520. Ming Zhuangyan puts his death at 500. The Japanese scholar Sasaki Kyōgo offers 420–500 CE.

Dignāga was a South Indian of Brahmin birth. He began with non-Buddhist traditions, moved on to the Vātsīputrīya school, then finally studied under Vasubandhu (世亲菩萨). He was formidable — widely read across all schools, with particular mastery of Yogācāra (唯识) and Buddhist logic (因明). At Nālandā he was the principal lecturer on these subjects, and he debated constantly with non-Buddhist teachers. Since none could match him in debate, they gave him the title "Bull King of Debate." According to Yijing, Dignāga's works on logic number eight: Examination of the Three Times (《观三世论》), Examination of Universal Characteristics (《观总相论》), Examination of Objects (《观境论》), Gateway of Causes (《因门论》), Gateway of Apparent Causes (《似因门论》), Nyāyamukha (《理门论》), Establishment of Examples (《取事施设论》), and Pramāṇasamuccaya (《集量论》) (the Tibetan translation still exists). Among these, Examination of Objects is what we usually call Ālambanaparīkṣā (《观所缘缘论》), and the Nyāyamukha is Pramāṇavārttika (《因明正理门论》). Other works include the Compendium of the Mother-of-Buddha Prajñāpāramitā (《佛母般若波罗蜜多圆集要义论》) and the Hastavālaprakarana itself.

The Tibetan tradition lists seven logical works by Dignāga: Pramāṇasamuccaya (《集量论》), its commentary Pramāṇasamuccaya-vṛtti (《集量论释》), Ālambanaparīkṣā (《观所缘缘论》) and its commentary, Examination of the Three Times (《观三世》), Determination of Causes (《因抉择》), and Nyāyapraveśa (《因明入正理论》). The Nyāyapraveśa, though, is by his student Śaṅkarasvāmin (商羯罗主), not by Dignāga. Beyond these seven, there are also works like Essential Lamp of the Abhidharmakośa (《俱舍精要灯论》) and Outline of the Eight-Thousand-Verse Prajñāpāramitā Sūtra (《八千颂般若经提要》).

The translator is Master Yijing (义净法师), another towering figure. He was born in 635 and died in 713. Some say he was from Zhuo County in Hebei; others, from Qizhou — today's Licheng in Shandong; still others, from Fanyang, the area southwest of present-day Beijing. He became a monk while still a boy. A bright child, he greatly admired Masters Faxian and Xuanzang, and so in the second year of the Xianheng era (671) he set out from Chang'an, traveled overland to Guangzhou, then took to sea by way of Śrīvijaya (present-day Sumatra), bound for India. He made a long pilgrimage, visiting holy sites such as Vulture Peak, the Deer Park, and Jetavana, then studied at Nālandā for ten years. After that he went on to Sumatra and studied another seven years. In all, he journeyed through more than thirty countries. Returning to China, he brought roughly four hundred Sanskrit scriptures and treatises, along with three hundred śarīra relics, back to Luoyang. Then came the work of translation. He first joined the translation hall of the Avataṃsaka Sūtra (《华严经》), working with Śikṣānanda and Bodhiruci, and later opened his own hall. Between 699 and 711 he produced fifty-six sūtras, vinaya texts, and treatises — 230 fascicles altogether — including the Suvarṇaprabhāsa Sūtra (《金光明最胜王经》), the Mahāmayūrī Dhāraṇī Sūtra (《大孔雀咒王经》), the Sūtra Spoken by the Buddha for Prince Vijayendra on Royal Law (《佛为胜光天子说王法经》), the Sūtra on the Original Vows and Merit of Bhaiṣajyaguru and the Lapis Lazuli Light of the Seven Buddhas (《药师琉璃光七佛本愿功德经》), the Sūtra on the Merit of Bathing the Buddha (《浴佛功德经》), the Sūtra Praising the Merit of the Tathāgata's Divine Mantras (《称赞如来功德神咒经》), the Mūlasarvāstivāda Vinaya (《根本说一切有部毗奈耶》), a text known as 《说一切有说跋窣堵》, and others. Vinaya texts made up the majority. Most of the Mūlasarvāstivāda Vinaya and other vinaya literature that survives in Chinese came through his hand.

The figure of fifty-six works in 230 fascicles is what we can document today, but in fact Yijing translated far more. According to Lu Can's contemporary Stele Inscription for Yijing's Memorial Pagoda (《义净塔铭》), the total comes to 107 works in 428 fascicles — meaning nearly half are now lost. In the history of Buddhism, Yijing stands alongside Kumārajīva, Paramārtha, and Xuanzang as one of the four great translators. He also left important writings of his own. His A Record of the Buddhist Religion as Practised in India and the Malay Archipelago (《南海寄归内法传》) describes Sino-Indian relations, Indian Buddhist culture, and social life, and remains a key historical source for the period. It also corrected various erroneous practices and vulgar customs that had crept into Chinese Buddhism — notably the burning of incense scars and the burning of the crown of the head, which Yijing made clear were improper. Some still practice these things today, but we know better.

His Memoirs of Eminent Monks Who Sought the Dharma in the Great Tang Western Regions (《大唐西域求法高僧传》) clearly explains the origins and spread of Indian esoteric Buddhism — questions that people are still debating today, though the answers were settled long ago. Honestly, it's a bit foolish: questions resolved centuries ago, yet the arguments drag on.

Now let us turn to the treatise itself.