To See the Buddha

Malcolm David Eckel takes us on a contemporary quest to discover the essential meaning behind the Buddha's many representations. Eckel's bold thesis proposes that the proper understanding of Buddhist philosophy must be thoroughly religious--an understanding revealed in Eckel's new translation of the philospher Bhavaviveka's major work,The Flame of Reason.Eckel shows that the dimensions of early Indian Buddhism--popular art, conventional piety, and critical philosophy--all work together to express the same religious yearning for the fullness of emptiness that Buddha conveys.

Malcolm David Eckel is Professor of the History of Religion at Boston University.

Abbreviations	p. vii
Acknowledgments	p. ix
Introduction	p. 1
The Palace of Reality	p. 9
The Story of the Asuras' Cave	p. 11
The Structure of Bhavaviveka's Thought	p. 22
Philosophy as a Cognitive Quest	p. 23
The Three-Part Structure of Bhavaviveka's Argument	p. 29
Points of Transition from One Stage in the Argument to Another	p. 42
Bhavaviveka's Ironical Point of View	p. 44
The Empty Throne	p. 49
Interpreting the Signs of the Buddha	p. 51
Hsuan-tsang's Encounter with the Indian Landscape	p. 51
The Buddha as a Place Where an Absence Is Present	p. 65
The Diachronic Dimension of the Buddha's Absence	p. 73
The Buddha's Previous Vows	p. 74
The Buddha's Manifestations	p. 84
The Buddha's Sustaining Power	p. 90
The Synchronic Dimension of the Buddha's Absence	p. 95
The Dharma Body	p. 97
The Eternal Buddha	p. 109
Bhavaviveka's Theory of the Buddha	p. 114
The Ultimate Buddha: A Negative Version of the Two-Body Theory	p. 115
The Conventional Buddha: A Positive Version of the Two-Body Theory	p. 122
The Three-Body Theory	p. 125
The Buddha Eye	p. 129
Buddhahood and the Language of the Senses	p. 131
Hsuan-tsang's Encounter with the Pirates	p. 131
Bhavaviveka and the Philosopher's Eyes	p. 137
Structural Similarities Between Different Kinds of Vision	p. 141
The Ranking of the Different Senses	p. 147
Translation: Bhavaviveka's Account of the Buddha in Chapter III of The Verses on the Essence of the Middle Way with the Commentary in The Flame of Reason	p. 153
Introductory Note	p. 155
The Ultimate Buddha	p. 158
The Bodhisattva Path	p. 172
The Conventional Buddha	p. 189
Corrections, Alternative Readings, and Emendations of the Text	p. 195
Notes	p. 197
Bibliography	p. 242
Index	p. 259
Table of Contents provided by Syndetics. All Rights Reserved.

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