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Asian Philosophy > Chinese Philosophy > Chinese Buddhist Philosophy > The Three-Treatise School of Chinese Buddhism
The Three-Treatise School of Chinese Buddhism
Edited by Chien-hsing Ho (Academia Sinica, Taiwan)
About this topic
| Summary | The Three-Treatise (or Sanlun) school is an orthodox Chinese Mādhyamika tradition. It was pioneered by Kumārajīva (344?-413?), a prestigious thinker and translator of Indian extraction, and his distinguished disciple Sengzhao (Seng-chao; 374?-414). The school was later revived by Jizang (Chi-tsang; 549-623). The school derives its name "Three-Treatise" from its emphasis on three translated texts of early Indian Madhyamaka:
Both Sengzhao and Jizang, the two leading philosophers of the school, uphold the view that all things are indeterminate and empty. Sengzhao affirms the nonduality of motion and rest, the myriad things and emptiness, and also the subject and the object. Jizang highlights the notion of nonacquisition (or nonattachment) and famously reinterprets and reconstructs the Mādhyamika doctrine of two truths. |
| Key works | Liebenthal 1968 provides a complete English translation of Sengzhao's main work, the Zhaolun, though it is often inaccurate. A few essays from this work are also available in English in Chan 1963 and Robinson 1967. Jizang’s main writings include the Profound Meaning of the Three Treatises (Sanlun xuanyi), the Meaning of the Two Truths (Erdi yi), and A Commentary on the Middle Treatise (Zhongguan lun shu). However, none of these texts by Jizang is available in English. |
| Introductions | Robinson 1967; Liu 1994. |
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- Is Emptiness Non-Empty? Jizang’s Conception of Buddha-Nature.Jenny Hung - 2025 - Religions 16 (2):184.Jizang (549–623) is regarded as a prominent figure in Sanlun Buddhism (三論宗) and a revitalizer of Nāgārjuna’s Mādhyamaka tradition in China. In this essay, I argue that Jizang’s concept of non-empty Buddha-nature is compatible with the idea of universal emptiness. My argument unfolds in three steps. First, I argue that, for Jizang, Buddha-nature is the Middle Way (zhongdao 中道), which signifies a spiritual state that avoids the extremes of both emptiness and non-emptiness. Next, I explore how and why Jizang believes (...)
- Worldly Indeterminacy and the Provisionality of Language.Chien-Hsing Ho - 2024 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy (4):896-904.Theorists who advocate worldly (metaphysical or ontological) indeterminacy—the idea that the world itself is indeterminate in one or more respects—should address how we understand the signifying nature and function of language in light of worldly indeterminacy. I first attend to Sengzhao and Jizang, two leading thinkers in Chinese Sanlun Buddhism, to reconstruct a Chinese Madhyamaka notion of ontic indeterminacy. Then, I draw on the thinkers’ views to propose a provisional (non-definitive) understanding of the nature and use of language. Under this (...)
- Transcending the ultimate duality.Graham Priest - 2023 - Asian Journal of Philosophy 2 (1):1-12.In many philosophical traditions, it is held that reality is non-dual. Of course, to be non-dual, as opposed to dual, is itself to partake of a certain duality. If reality really is non-dual, it must transcend this duality too. But what could this mean? Can one make coherent sense of it? To keep the discussion focussed, I will locate it in one specific tradition: the Mahāyāna Buddhist tradition. The idea that ultimate reality is non-dual goes back to the earliest Mahāyāna (...)
- (1 other version)Can the World Be Indeterminate in All Respects?Chien-Hsing Ho - 2022 - Ergo: An Open Access Journal of Philosophy 9: 584-602.Especially over the past twenty years, a number of analytic philosophers have embraced the idea that the world itself is vague or indeterminate in one or more respects. The issue then arises as to whether it can be the case that the world itself is indeterminate in all respects. Using as a basis Chinese Madhyamaka Buddhist thought, I offer two reasons for the coherence and intelligibility of the thesis that all concrete things are themselves indeterminate with respect to the ways (...)
- Causation and Ontic Indeterminacy.Chien-Hsing Ho - 2021 - Res Philosophica 98 (1):43-61.In this article, I first introduce an Indian Madhyamaka Buddhist critique of causality and discuss critically a contemporary Humean interpretation of the critique. After presenting a Chinese Madhyamaka interpretation, I resort to an ontological conception of indeterminacy, termed ontic indeterminacy, which draws on Chinese Madhyamaka thought together with Jessica Wilson’s account of metaphysical indeterminacy, to show that the conception is well equipped to unravel two puzzling issues that arise from the critique. I suggest that a world that consists of things (...)
- Ontic Indeterminacy: Chinese Madhyamaka in the Contemporary Context.Chien-Hsing Ho - 2020 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 98 (3):419-433.A number of analytical philosophers have recently endorsed the view that the world itself is indeterminate in some respect. Intriguingly, ideas similar to the view are expressed by thinkers from Chinese Madhyamaka Buddhism, which may shed light on the current discussion of worldly indeterminacy. Using as a basis Chinese Madhyamaka thought, together with Jessica Wilson’s account of indeterminacy, I develop an ontological conception of indeterminacy, termed ontic indeterminacy, which centres on two complementary ideas—conclusive indeterminability and provisional determinability. I show that (...)
- Lessons from the Sanjie: Merit Economies as Catalysts for Social Change.Leah Kalmanson - 2019 - Studies in Chinese Religions 5 (2):142-150.When considering questions of Buddhism, business and the economy, the production and transfer of karmic merit is an often-overlooked resource, perhaps due to the unexamined assumption that merit is not, after all, ‘real.’ This essay aims to show that taking merit production seriously reveals a well-established economic model that operates alongside, and at times contrary to, systems of monetary exchange. Precisely because of the tendency to interface with money economies, networks of merit transfer can intervene in common economic practices underlying (...)Remove from this listExport citation
Bookmark - The ethical implications of Sengzhao’s concept of the Sage.Wei-Hung Yen - 2019 - Asian Philosophy 29 (1):79-87.ABSTRACTThis paper is an exploration of the ethical significance of Sengzhao’s concept of the sage as exhibited through a Buddhist practitioner’s expanded understanding and cognition of reality. From a philosophical point of view, I aim to show that the ethical significance of his concept of the sage comprises a shift first from ontology to epistemology, and then from epistemology to ethics. I firstly define Sengzhao’s concept of the sage and present a preliminary account of this concept before elaborating on its (...)
- The Nonduality of Motion and Rest: Sengzhao on the Change of Things.Chien-Hsing Ho - 2017 - In Youru Wang & Sandra A. Wawrytko, Dao Companion to Chinese Buddhist Philosophy. Dordrecht: Springer Verlag. pp. 175-188.In his essay “Things Do Not Move,” Sengzhao (374?−414 CE), a prominent Chinese Buddhist philosopher, argues for the thesis that the myriad things do not move in time. This view is counter-intuitive and seems to run counter to the Mahayana Buddhist doctrine of emptiness. In this book chapter, I assess Sengzhao’s arguments for his thesis, elucidate his stance on the change/nonchange of things, and discuss related problems. I argue that although Sengzhao is keen on showing the plausibility of the thesis, (...)$161.98 used (collection) View on Amazon.comRemove from this list Direct download (3 more)Export citation Bookmark 2 citations
- The Nonduality of Motion and Rest: Sengzhao on the Change of Things.Chien-Hsing Ho - 2017 - In Youru Wang & Sandra A. Wawrytko, Dao Companion to Chinese Buddhist Philosophy. Dordrecht: Springer Verlag. pp. 175-188.In his essay “Things Do Not Move,” Sengzhao, a prominent Chinese Buddhist philosopher, argues for the thesis that the myriad things do not move in time. This view is counter-intuitive and seems to run counter to the Mahayana Buddhist doctrine of emptiness. I assess Sengzhao’s arguments for his thesis, elucidate his stance on the change/nonchange of things, and discuss related problems. I argue that although Sengzhao is keen on showing the plausibility of the thesis, he actually views the myriad things (...)$161.98 used (collection) View on Amazon.comRemove from this list Direct downloadExport citation Bookmark
- Resolving the Ineffability Paradox.Chien-Hsing Ho - 2015 - In Arindam Chakrabarti & Ralph Weber, Comparative Philosophy without Borders. New York: Bloomsbury Publishing. pp. 69-82.A number of contemporary philosophers think that the unqualified statement “X is unspeakable” faces the danger of self-referential absurdity: if this statement is true, it must simultaneously be false, given that X is speakable by the predicate word “unspeakable.” This predicament is in this chapter formulated as an argument that I term the “ineffability paradox.” After examining the Buddhist semantic theory of apoha (exclusion) and an apoha solution to the issue, I resort to a few Chinese Buddhist and Hindu philosophical (...)
- Emptiness as Subject-Object Unity: Sengzhao on the Way Things Truly Are.Chien-Hsing Ho - 2014 - In JeeLoo Liu & Douglas L. Berger, Nothingness in Asian Philosophy. New York: Routledge. pp. 104-118.Sengzhao (374?−414 CE), a leading Chinese Mādhyamika philosopher, holds that the myriad things are empty, and that they are, at bottom, the same as emptiness qua the way things truly are. In this paper, I distinguish the level of the myriad things from that of the way things truly are and call them, respectively, the ontic and the ontological levels. For Sengzhao, the myriad things at the ontic level are indeterminate and empty, and he equates the way things truly are (...)
- The Way of Nonacquisition: Jizang's Philosophy of Ontic Indeterminacy.Chien-Hsing Ho - 2014 - In Chen-Kuo Lin & Michael Radich, A Distant Mirror: Articulating Indic Ideas in Sixth and Seventh Century Chinese Buddhism. Hamburg University Press. pp. 397-418.For Jizang (549−623), a prominent philosophical exponent of Chinese Madhyamaka, all things are empty of determinate form or nature. Given anything X, no linguistic item can truly and conclusively be applied to X in the sense of positing a determinate form or nature therein. This philosophy of ontic indeterminacy is connected closely with his notion of the Way (dao), which seems to indicate a kind of ineffable principle of reality. However, Jizang also equates the Way with nonacquisition as a conscious (...)
- Ontic Indeterminacy and Paradoxical Language: A Philosophical Analysis of Sengzhao’s Linguistic Thought.Chien-Hsing Ho - 2013 - Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy 12 (4):505-522.For Sengzhao (374−414 CE), a leading Sanlun philosopher of Chinese Buddhism, things in the world are ontologically indeterminate in that they are devoid of any determinate form or nature. In his view, we should understand and use words provisionally, so that they are not taken to connote the determinacy of their referents. To echo the notion of ontic indeterminacy and indicate the provisionality of language, his main work, the Zhaolun, abounds in paradoxical expressions. In this essay, I offer a philosophical (...)
- One Name, Infinite Meanings: Jizang’s Thought on Meaning and Reference.Chien-Hsing Ho - 2012 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 39 (3):436-452.Jizang sets forth a hermeneutical theory of “one name, infinite meanings” that proposes four types of interpretation of word meaning to the effect that a nominal word X means X, non-X, the negation of X, and all things whatsoever. In this article, I offer an analysis of the theory, with a view to elucidating Jizang's thought on meaning and reference and considering its contemporary significance. The theory, I argue, may best be viewed as an expedient means for telling us how (...)
- The Nonduality of Speech and Silence: A Comparative Analysis of Jizang’s Thought on Language and Beyond.Chien-Hsing Ho - 2012 - Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy 11 (1):1-19.Jizang (549−623 CE), the key philosophical exponent of the Sanlun tradition of Chinese Buddhism, based his philosophy considerably on his reading of the works of Nāgārjuna (c.150−250 CE), the founder of the Indian Madhyamaka school. However, although Jizang sought to follow Nāgārjuna closely, there are salient features in his thought on language that are notably absent from Nāgārjuna’s works. In this paper, I present a philosophical analysis of Jizang’s views of the relationship between speech and silence and compare them with (...)
- Time, Temporality, and the Characteristic Marks of the Conditioned: Sarvāstivāda and Madhyamaka Buddhist Interpretations.Bart Dessein - 2011 - Asian Philosophy 21 (4):341-360.According to the Buddhist concept of ‘dependent origination’ (pratītyasamutpāda), discrete factors come into existence because of a combination of causes (hetu) and conditions (pratyaya). Such discrete factors, further, are combinations of five aggregates (pañ caskandha) that, themselves, are subject to constant change. Discrete factors, therefore, lack a self-nature (ātman). The passing through time of discrete factors is characterized by the ‘characteristic marks of the conditioned’: birth (utpāda), change in continuance (sthityanyathātva), and passing away (vyaya); or, alternatively: birth (jāti), duration (sthiti), (...)
- Ambivalence of Illusion: A Chinese Buddhist Perspective.Hans-Rudolf Kantor - 2011 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 38 (2):274-292.
- The “dual citizenship” of emptiness: A reading of the bu zhenkong Lun.Galia Patt-Shamir - 2011 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 38 (3):474-490.
- ‘Right Words are Like the Reverse’—The Daoist Rhetoric and the Linguistic Strategy in Early Chinese Buddhism.Hans-Rudolf Kantor - 2010 - Asian Philosophy 20 (3):283-307.?Right words are like the reverse? is the concluding remark of chap. 78 in the Daoist classic Daodejing. Quoted in treatises composed by Seng Zhao (374?414), it designates the linguistic strategy used to unfold the Buddhist Madhyamaka meaning of ?emptiness? and ?ultimate truth?. In his treatise Things Do not Move, Seng Zhao demonstrates that ?motion and stillness? are not really contradictory, performing the deconstructive meaning of Buddhist ?emptiness? via the corresponding linguistic strategy. Though the topic of the discussion and the (...)
- The Finger Pointing toward the Moon: A Philosophical Analysis of the Chinese Buddhist Thought of Reference.Chien-Hsing Ho - 2008 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 35 (1):159-177.In this essay I attempt a philosophical analysis of the Chinese Buddhist thought of linguistic reference to shed light on how the Buddhist understands the way language refers to an ineffable reality. For this purpose, the essay proceeds in two directions: an enquiry into the linguistic thoughts of Sengzhao (374-414 CE) and Jizang (549-623 CE), two leading Chinese Madhyamika thinkers, and an analysis of the Buddhist simile of a moon-pointing finger. The two approaches respectively constitute the horizontal and vertical axes (...)
- Emptiness, Being and Non-being: Sengzhao’s Reinterpretation of the Laozi and Zhuangzi in a Buddhist Context.Tan Mingran - 2008 - Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy 7 (2):195-209.This essay argues two main points by analyzing Sengzhao’s contentions regarding several basic Buddhist concepts such as emptiness, being, and nonbeing. First, Sengzhao synthesizes Daoist methods of argumentation into his description of the middle path and other Buddhist concepts. Second, he revives Daoist concepts, giving them Buddhist meaning and expressing them in Buddhist terms. In the process, he consciously differentiates Madhyamika Buddhism from earlier Buddhism as understood from a Daoist perspective, such as the teachings of the School of Original Non-Being (...)
- Signs of liberation?—A semiotic approach to wisdom in chinese madhyamika buddhism.Brian Bocking & Youxuan Wang - 2006 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 33 (3):375–392.
- Response to Robert Magliola’s Review Article on My View of Madhyamika Buddhism.Kuang-Ming Wu - 2006 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 33 (2):299-301.
- Sengzhao.Jeffrey Dippmann - 2004 - Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.Remove from this listExport citation Bookmark
- Nagarjuna and Chi-Tsang on the Value of “This World”: A Reply to Kuang-Ming Wu’s Critique of Indian and Chinese Madhyamika Buddhism.Robert Magliola - 2004 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 31 (4):505–516.
- Denkansätze zur buddhistischen Philosophie in China: Seng Zhao, Jizang, Fazang zwischen Übersetzung und Interpretation.Rolf Elberfeld - 2000 - Köln: Edition Chora. Edited by Michael Leibold & Mathias Obert.
- Time and emptiness in the Chao-Lun.Muchael Berman - 1997 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 24 (1):43-58.
- Madhyamaka Thought in China.Ming-Wood Liu - 1994 - E.J. Brill.This book examines the three stages of development of Chinese Madhyamaka, focusing attention on the different ways the representative figures of each stage applied basic Madhyamaka principles to deal with the central Buddhist doctrinal issues of their age.
- A Chinese madhyamaka theory of truth: The case of Chi-Tsang.Ming-Wood Liu - 1993 - Philosophy East and West 43 (4):649-673.
- Derrida and Seng-Zhao: Linguistic and Philosophical Deconstructions.Cai Zongqi - 1993 - Philosophy East and West 43 (3):389 - 404.
- Self-reflection in the sanlun tradition: Madhyamika as the "deconstructive conscience" of buddhism.Alan Fox - 1992 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 19 (1):1-24.
- On the paradoxical method of the chinese mādhyamika: Seng-Chao and the Chao-Lun treatise.Shohei Ichimura - 1992 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 19 (1):51-71.
- Junshi no shisō: shizen shusai no ryō tendōkan to seibokusetsu.Rokurō Kodama - 1992 - Tōkyō: Kazama Shobō.
- Seng-chao and the mādhyamka way of refutation.Ming-Wood Liu - 1987 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 14 (1):97-110.
- Book Review of Hsueh-li Cheng's Empty Logic: Madhyamike Buddhism from Chinese Sources. [REVIEW]Alan Fox - 1986 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 13 (3):361-364.
- The yogācārā and mādhyamika interpretations of the Buddha-nature concept in chinese buddhism.Ming-Wood Liu - 1985 - Philosophy East and West 35 (2):171-193.
- The Two Truths Controversy in China and Chih-I's Threefold Truth Concept.Paul Loren Swanson - 1985 - Dissertation, The University of Wisconsin - MadisonThe meaning of the two truths--the worldly or mundane truth samvrtisatya , and the real or supreme truth -- was a hotly debated topic among Chinese Buddhists in the 5th and 6th century a.d. From the time of Kumarajiva this issue was discussed in terms of yu and wu . Usually yu was iden- tified with samvrtisatya and wu with paramarthasatya, leading to the mistaken conclusion that the two truths represent two separate realities. The ambiguous meaning of these terms also (...)Remove from this listExport citation Bookmark
- Empty Logic: Madhyamika Buddhism from Chinese sources.Hsueh-li Cheng - 1984 - Philosophical Library.In this book Prof. Cheng deals with its principle doctrines, its philosophy and its influence on.
- Chi-tsang's "Sheng-man pao-k'u:" The true Dharma doctrine and the bodhisattva ideal.Aaron K. Koseki - 1984 - Philosophy East and West 34 (1):67-83.
- Once more on the two truths: What does Chi–Tsang mean by the two truths as ‘Yüeh–Chiao’?Whalen W. Lai - 1983 - Religious Studies 19 (4):505-521.The teaching of the Buddha concerning Reality has recourse to Two Truths: the Mundane and the Highest Truth. Without knowing the distinction between the two, one does not know the profound point of the teachings. The Highest Truth cannot be taught apart from the Mundane, but without understanding the former, one does not apprehend nirvāna.
- Causality as soteriology: An analysis of the central philosophy of buddhism.Hsüeh-Li Cheng - 1982 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 9 (4):423-440.
- Chi-Tsang’s Treatment of Metaphysical Issues.Hsueh-Li Cheng - 1981 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 8 (3):371-389.
- Nāgārjuna, Kant and Wittgenstein: The San–Lun Mādhyamika Exposition of Emptiness.Hsueh–li Cheng - 1981 - Religious Studies 17 (1):67 - 85.Among Western scholars there has been a growing interest in Buddhist philosophy, especially in the philosophical teachings of the Mādhyamika. Mādhyamika philosophy is considered to be ‘the most important outcome of Buddha's teaching’ and to represent ‘philosophical Buddhism par excellence’. The main message of Mādhyamika Buddhism is the doctrine of emptiness. Yet scholars, as well as students of Buddhism, have often been puzzled about this teaching and have misinterpreted it. The chief purpose of this paper is to expound the Mādhyamika (...)
- The concept of practice in San-Lun thought: Chi-Tsang and the "concurrent insight" of the two truths.Aaron K. Koseki - 1981 - Philosophy East and West 31 (4):449-466.
- Some notes on perceptions of pratītya-samutpd́ in china from kumŕv́ to fa-Yao.Whalen Lai - 1981 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 8 (4):427-435.
- Motion and rest in the middle treatise.Hsueh-Li Cheng - 1980 - Journal of Chinese Philosophy 7 (3):229-244.
- Further developments of the two truths theory in china: The "ch'eng-Shih-Lun" tradition and Chou Yung's "San-Tsung-Lun".Whalen W. Lai - 1980 - Philosophy East and West 30 (2):139-161.
- Sinitic understanding of the two truths theory in the Liang dynasty (502-557): Ontological gnosticism in the thoughts of Prince Chao-Ming. [REVIEW]Whalen W. Lai - 1978 - Philosophy East and West 28 (3):339-351.
- Skepticism, ordinary language and zen buddhism.Dick Garner - 1977 - Philosophy East and West 27 (2):165-181.The goal of tranquility through non-Assertion, Advocated by sextus empiricus, Is examined and his method criticized. His understanding of non-Assertion is compared with that of seng-Chao (383-414) and chi-Tsang (549-623). Zen buddhism shares the quest for tranquility, But offers more than sextus did to help us attain it, And avoids the excessively metaphysical thought of these two chinese buddhists. Wittgenstein, Whose goal was that philosophical problems completely disappear, And austin, Who rejected many standard western dichotomies, Offer a method superior to (...)
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