From the Mūlamadhyamakakārikā
—
Born in Maharashtra, India, Nāgārjuna (150–250 C.E.) is considered the founder of the Madhyamaka school of Mahāyāna Buddhism. A great philosopher, he is seen as almost a second Buddha for Tibetan and Zen Buddhism. Little is known of his life, but there is a story that he learned the perfection of wisdom from the mythical Nāgas (semi-divine snake beings), who preserved the true teaching of the Buddha. The Mūlamadhyamakakārikā (the fundamental verses of the middle) is Nāgārjuna’s magnum opus, in which he establishes the path of emptiness between annihilation and permanence. These two poems, “Reincarnation” and “Liberation,” are a literary translation of this Sanskrit text, which seeks to capture and preserve its poetic and enigmatic nature. Nāgārjuna’s language in these verses is fairly simple, but every term carries with it an entire universe of meaning for Buddhism. He constantly leads the reader through a logically complicated path of being, negation, and denial into an apparent contradiction and collapse.
Chris Rahlwes
—
Reincarnation
The Buddha uttered,
“An emergence isn’t known.”
Reincarnation is unending,
without beginning.
No beginning nor end.
You ask,
“Where is the middle?”
Without beginning or end,
there is no succession,
there is no middle.
Beginning with birth
Aging and dying would come later,
birth without
aging
and dying.
An immortal would be born.
Ending with birth
Aging
and dying
would be before birth.
I ask,
“How would you age
and die
from an uncaused non-birth?”
Birth and death together
Being born,
you would be dead.
Each would be uncaused.
In reincarnation,
there is no before,
no after.
You ask,
“Who is there to imagine
birthing,
aging,
dying?”
I reply,
effect,
cause,
characteristic,
marking,
sensation,
sensor,
anybody,
anything
is not discovered
in reincarnation.
Before
or after
is never discovered.
Liberation
If formations co-reincarnate,
they are not permanent.
If formations don’t reincarnate,
they are impermanent.
All living beings are like this.
You ask,
“If one reincarnates
and in investigating
the segments,
senses,
and elements,
we discover nothing,
who or what is reincarnated?”
One who only reincarnates from sensing to sensing
would be free of being.
I ask,
“If freed from being,
who is there to sense?
who is there to reincarnate?”
Someone or something
Liberation is never approachable for formations.
Formations wax and wane;
they are not bound,
they are not free.
Liberation is never approachable for living beings.
Living beings wax and wane;
they are not bound,
they are not free.
Bondage of the reincarnator
Binding of sensing entails
a sensor that is not bound.
You ask,
“If non-grasping is not bondage,
how is one bound?”
If bondage is bound before binding,
you are prebound;
but you are not.
This is like
the going,
the gone,
the non-gone.
As the bound is not freed,
the unbound is not freed.
If the bound is freed,
bondage and freedom
are simultaneous.
“No longer dwelling,
I unsensing,
enter liberation.”
To grasp this is to grasp true sensing.
I ask,
“When we do not apply liberation
or reject reincarnation,
what is reincarnation?
what is liberation?”
[Translated from the Sanskrit by Chris Rahlwes]