Buddhist Philosophy in India and Ceylon c8.s4.32

c8.s4.32

There is a similar error in interpreting idealistically the signification of Saṃkhāra⁴ when used as a synonym of Dhamma of things in general. We should not regard the Saṃkhāras as things in relation to mind (*saṃkhata*); rather the term has the more general signification of product, as well as of producing, and it is therefore naturally and directly applied to the whole world of external reality as well as to mental products. The Vijñānavādins would have us believe that Buddhism was always idealist, but the Madhyamakas deny it energetically, and the early texts bear witness in their favour. It is a heresy to hold that material things endure but for the moment of the thought which apprehends them;⁵ the body by reason of its duration is in a sense a truer self than consciousness with its constant change.⁶