Philosopher

Candrakīrti

c. 600 – c. 650 CE

Also known as Candrakirti, Chandrakirti

Madhyamaka commentator whose Clear Words defended Buddhapālita's reductio method against Bhāviveka, and whose 'Prāsaṅgika' reading became authoritative in Tibet.

Line drawing of a seated monk in a pointed cap within a frame, with a Tibetan inscription below — Drawing in the style of a Tibetan woodblock icon, from the Asian Classics Input Project: an imagined likeness.Public domain · See the original

Candrakīrti wrote the Clear Words, the only commentary on Nāgārjuna’s Fundamental Verses on the Middle Way known to survive in Sanskrit, which preserves the Sanskrit text of Nāgārjuna’s verses. Much of its first chapter defends Buddhapālita’s approach and attacks Bhāviveka’s.

He had little influence in India itself, but re-emerged in Tibet, where many schools take his ‘Prāsaṅgika’ interpretation as authoritative; his Introduction to Madhyamaka is the main Madhyamaka text of many Tibetan monastic curricula.

Key ideas

Reductio, not independent inference: Following Buddhapālita, Candrakīrti held that a Mādhyamika should only draw out the absurd consequences of an opponent’s view, not offer formal inferences of his own, and he criticised Bhāviveka’s method as misguided.
Analysis of concepts: His arguments examine the concepts our explanations of experience take for granted, not experience itself: if a sprout cannot come from burning coals, then on the opponent’s assumptions it cannot come from a seed either.
No privileged categories: There can be no explanatory categories that escape the features of the conventional world, above all dependent origination; any analytic reasoning that claims to stand outside it fails.

Tradition: Indian
Region: India
Schools: Madhyamaka
Branches: Metaphysics; Epistemology
Themes: What is ultimately real

Influences

Influenced by

Candrakīrtic. 600 – c. 650 CE

Influenced

Tsongkhapa1357–1419

Influenced by

Candrakīrtic. 600 – c. 650 CE

Influenced

Tsongkhapa1357–1419

Where these links come from

Candrakīrti drew on Nāgārjuna. Source: Dan Arnold, Madhyamaka Buddhist Philosophy, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Candrakīrti drew on Buddhapālita. Source: Dan Arnold, Madhyamaka Buddhist Philosophy, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Candrakīrti argued against Bhāviveka. Source: Dan Arnold, Madhyamaka Buddhist Philosophy, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Tsongkhapa drew on Candrakīrti. Source: Gareth Sparham and Chandra Chiara Ehm, Tsongkhapa, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Key works

Clear Words (Prasannapadā)
Introduction to Madhyamaka (Madhyamakāvatāra)

Sources

Dan Arnold, Madhyamaka Buddhist Philosophy, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy