འཕགས་པ་རན་པ་ཆའ་མཐའ་ཞས་བྱ་བ་ཐག་པ་ཆན་པའ་མད notes.1

notes.1

1. This particular equation is made in the Mahā­prajñāpāramitā­śāstra attributed to Nāgārjuna (Lamotte 2001, p. 47). Elsewhere in his translation of this text, Lamotte cites a number of other canonical sources that provide lists of synonyms for the ultimate nature, all of which include the term bhūtakoṭi (ibid., p. 52, n. 103). Grammatically, bhūtakoṭi can be read as both a tatpuruṣa and a karmadhāraya compound. In support of reading it as a tatpuruṣa, Ratnākaraśānti, when explaining the term in his Muktāvalī (Toh 1189), glosses bhūta by tattva (“reality”), and koṭi by agra (“edge,” “limit”) (Tripathi 2001, p. 96). Both words in this compound are nouns. Lamotte also adopted this reading in his French translation of the Mahā­prajñāpāramitā­śāstra, where, in the English translation of his work, the term is rendered “summit of existence” (2001, p. 47). On the other hand, Edgerton (1953, p. 410) takes bhūtakoṭi to be a karmadhāraya compound, meaning “true goal” (bhūta = “true” and koṭi = “goal”). What may underlie these different interpretations is the fact that the word bhūta can be used both as an adjective meaning “real/true” and as a noun meaning “reality/truth.” In this translation, we have opted to read the term as a tatpuruṣa compound.