Aspects of Mahayana Buddhism and its Relation to Hinayana c7.s2.t13.6

c7.s2.t13.6

The *Aṣṭasāhasrikā* and other *Prajñāpāramitās*, though unrelenting in their negation of every possible statement about the reality, never assert that Tathatā or Śūnyatā or Dharmakāya in its real sense is also non-existing. The statements like ‘tathatāvikārā nirvikārāvikalpā nirvikalpā’ (Suchness is immutable, unchangeable, beyond percept and distinctions)² show rather a positive conception of the Reality than a purely negative one. In regard to the Dharmakāya also the *Aṣṭasāhasrikā* makes similar statements. It says that he who knows that the dharmas, existing in the world or preached by the Tathāgata, have no more existence than things in a dream and, does not enquire whence the Tathāgata comes and where he goes, realises the Tathāgata through Dharmatā.³ The Buddhakāya, that people speak of, arises through cause and condition like the sound of a flute; it involves really no appearance or disappearance. Those who run after the form and voice of the Tathāgata and conceive of his appearance and disappearance are far from the Truth.¹ No further statements than this can be made about the Reality, for that would be again prapañca. When the Aṣṭasāhasrikā asserts that the Tathāgata does not exist, it refers to that Tathāgata as conceived by one on reading the Mahāyāna texts. Even the Bodhisattvas, unless and until they reach the tenth bhūmi, cannot extricate themselves from a conception of the Tathāgatakāya, however subtle it may be (e.g. the Svasambhogakāya). They are still under a delusion and it is this delusion that the Prajñāpāramitās endeavour to remove by asserting that there is no Tathāgata.