Dharmakirti

Dzieła

• ok. 640Pramanavarttika

  Komentarz do Dignagi, który stał się standardowym dziełem buddyjskiej epistemologii: realne są percepcja, wnioskowanie i tylko chwilowe jednostkowości.

Stanowisko

Dharmakirti systematised Dignaga’s epistemology. There are only two means of knowledge: perception, which grasps unique, momentary particulars free of concepts, and inference, which works with general concepts. What is real is what has causal efficacy; since whatever is efficacious must change at every moment, all real things are momentary. Universals are mental constructs, explained by exclusion (apoha): “cow” means “not non-cow”. Valid reasons rest on identity of nature, on causation or on non-perception. With these tools he defended rebirth and the Buddha’s authority against materialists and rejected God, an enduring self and the Mimamsa doctrine of the authorless Veda – a dispute tied to Kumarila, though who answered whom is debated.

Życie i kontekst

According to later Tibetan histories, Dharmakirti was born into a Brahmin family in South India, became a Buddhist monk and studied at Nalanda, where a pupil of Dignaga taught him. These accounts are late and partly legendary. He is usually dated to the 7th century CE, about 600–660, but some scholars now place him earlier, around 550–610. His works became the standard of Buddhist epistemology in India and Tibet.

Dalsze główne dzieła

• Ascertainment of Valid Cognition (Pramanavinishcaya, 7th century CE)
• A Drop of Reasoning (Nyayabindu, 7th century CE)

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