Audio recorded at Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Kyabje Rinpoche examines Nāgārjuna’s foundational argument for the lack of true existence, drawn from Candrakīrti’s Entering into the Middle Way. In this 46-minute session, he walks through the second of five reasons establishing non-true existence: the tetralemma refutation, which states that nothing is produced from self, other, both, or causelessly. Rinpoche begins with the bodhisattva motivation to benefit all beings through understanding emptiness, then systematically addresses each of the four extremes—explaining which Buddhist and non-Buddhist schools historically held each view, why each fails logically, and how refuting all four modes of production establishes that a sprout (or any phenomenon) cannot be truly existent. He uses concrete examples: planting seeds, the relationship between a seed and sprout, and the Tibetan flower metaphor (metok). Throughout, he stresses the reliance on valid reasoning rather than mere assertion. Pitched at students studying the Madhyamaka philosophical tradition.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 1991-06-13 – 13A – KR.mp3
UUID: 61636629-82b0-4ec6-9860-d70ace975e4a
Teacher: Kyabje Rinpoche
Collection: Entering the Middle Way
Date: 1991-06-13
Recorded at: Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide
Words: ~2,757
# Entering The Middle Way 13a 1991-06-13
**Collection:** Rinpoche Recordings — Entering the Middle Way (1991)
**Duration:** 45.6 minutes
**Words:** 2,752
**Model:** Deepgram Nova-3
**Corrections applied:** 0
**Transcribed:** 2026-02-28 23:43
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I must, for the sake of all sentient beings and myself, in order to lead them to complete happiness, achieve the state of Buddhahood. Once I achieved the level of Buddhahood, then I will be able to lead all sentient beings to a state of completely eliminated suffering and complete happiness in which they experience complete happiness. So we’ll cultivate the awakening heart for the next three minutes thinking that in order to achieve this end I must listen to, reflect and meditate on the essence of the great vehicle, the meaning of emptiness, in order to be of the best benefit to sentient beings. So according to a verse by Candrakīrti in his supplement, in his Entering Into the Middle Way, we have been discussing the five reasons establishing non-true existence, and now we’re explaining in detail the second of these five reasons which is contained in this verse stating that nothing whatsoever is produced from self, other, both, or causelessly.
If nothing is produced in any of these four ways, how can anything be truly existent? We, as our subject, a sprout is not truly existent and the reason which is presented is that it’s not produced in any of the four extremes of the modes of production. It is not produced in any of the four modes of production. And this would be that the extreme of being produced from itself, the extreme of other, both, or causelessly, and therefore a sprout is not truly existent. So beginning with the first extreme mode of production, that is the extreme of self, in which as said in Entering the Middle Way, nothing is produced from self and the sprout is not produced from self.
And the second extreme mode of production, extreme mode of production is the extreme of being produced from other. Then the third extreme mode of production would be having taken both the extremes of self and other individually, then they’re refuted as to that something is produced somehow by means of both self and other. And the fourth extreme mode of production would be to be produced from no cause that would cause this production. So we can determine from the reasons that the sprout is not produced from self, is not produced from others, not produced from both, and is not produced causelessly.
Because it’s not produced in any of these four ways, by means of that reason we can establish that the sprout is not truly existent. So we’re presenting four reasons upon which we can come to a determination that we should make use of reasoning in whatever determinations that we’re making whatsoever. We can’t make determination on the basis of without reason. So therefore we’re making use of reasonings. So if we were to say that the flower is very good, taking that as an example, how do we come to this determination?
What reasons can we use to support this determination, this conclusion? Well we can go on to say, well the color is very good, its shape, it has a very nice fragrance, and it’s very beautiful. Upon these various reasons, then we can establish and come to the conclusion that it’s a very good flower and the flower is very good. And likewise, if we were considering another flower and we said this flower is not good, then in dependence upon what do we make that determination? We say, well because it doesn’t have a nice color, it doesn’t have a nice shape, it has a bad smell, it’s not pretty, and therefore, in dependence upon these reasons, we conclude that the flower is not a good flower.
So in both of these cases, whether it’s a good flower or not a good flower, we rely upon four different reasons in order to come to some determination, and that we can say what we are saying. In each of these cases we rely upon these reasonings and in dependence upon that we can make a certain statement about the flower. So likewise, we’re going to take as the basis of our understanding a sprout. Entering the Middle Way speaks a great deal about sprouts, so it would be good to know what we mean by a sprout. A sprout is something when you plant the seed in a field and you add water and fertilizer, etc., then a plant grows.
And when this plantlet is about a hand span high, then we call it a sprout or a seedling. So we want to come to some conclusion about this sprout. We want to conclude that it’s not naturally existent, that it’s not truly existent. We’re using the reasoning set forth by Nāgārjuna in making this determination. So we are trying to determine that the sprout is not truly existent.
So the lower tenet schools ask the question, well what reasons can you give for saying that the sprout is not truly existent? And we come to the determination that the sprout is not truly existent in dependence upon the fact that if the sprout were to be truly existent it would have to be produced in either of the four ways, modes of production. It would either have to be produced from itself or produced from other, produced from both, or produced causelessly. If something is truly existent it must be produced in either of these four ways, and since it is not produced in either of these four ways, it is not truly existent.
Understood. So by produce, we mean that which is established in dependence upon causes and conditions. For example, we take a seed. When the seed exists, the sprout doesn’t exist. There’s no sprout when we have a seed.
We take the seed which is the cause and we put it in the earth. We plant it. And various factors of water, earth are the conditions. These two together, these causes and conditions, the seed, the water and earth together, coming together produce a result, an effect. So that is the sprout.
So this is what we mean by production. Is that okay? What would be a non-traditional sense? Like being imputed by conception. Do you mean like that way?
So, you know, two parents come together, they have a relationship. Out of it a child is born and that child is given a name, say for example, Tashi, and it depends upon being given that name plus the birth of the child, then Tashi comes into existence. But here by production we’re not talking about being produced in dependence upon being given names or being imputed. We are not referring to relying upon everything relies upon names, but now what we talk about production here is not relying upon names. We’re not talking about that way of being produced, relying upon names and conception.
So that which is newly produced in dependence upon aggregation of causes and conditions, we say is produced. So the entity which is newly established in dependence upon the aggregation of cause and condition, that is what we call that production. That is mode of production. That is what we mean by being produced. Something which is newly established in dependence upon an aggregation of causes and conditions is being produced. This is what we mean by production.
So Nāgārjuna is trying to establish that the sprout is not truly existent. And the reason he gives to establish this, to come to this conclusion, to make this determination is that the sprout is not produced in either of the four ways of being produced from itself, from other, from both self and others, or causelessly. And if something is not produced in any of these four ways it cannot be truly existent. And this is the reason he is giving to us for us to come to determination in a way that this sprout is not truly existent. The position is between the two extremes.
And these two extremes are the one, a superimposition of an existent upon a nonexistent. That would be the case of eternalism, the view of eternalism. And the second would be the extreme of nihilism where what does in fact exist is deprecated to a point where it does not exist. And this would be the extreme of nihilism. So the centrist position is between these two extremes, the extreme of nihilism on the one hand and eternalism on the other.
Yes. So all four of these modes of production are representative of extreme views. The first three, that is the production from self is eternalism, and production from other is nihilism. Production from both self and other is eternalism. Causeless production is nihilism.
So if we were to ask, well, in fact who holds these various positions? Then with respect to the first position, that is production from self, Nāgārjuna sought to refute a specific non-Buddhist school which held the tenet of production from self. And this was in Tibetan it’s called Drangcharba, and I think that’s translated as Sāṃkhya. Sāṃkhya who held production from self. And then with respect to those who held the position of production from other, this was the Buddhist schools, the Great Exposition School, the Sūtra School, the Mind Only School, and Autonomy Middle Way School.
These all held production from others. Then there was the school which held production from both self and others was the school, in Tibetan, it’s called Ubhayavada. And for example they would, in the case of a pot, the pot is produced by a potter, someone who forms the pot. This was production from self and it’s made from various substances whether it was gold or earth or clay, whatever, then this was considered other. Or in the case of a seed that someone would have to make effort in planting the seed and this was self and that the earth and the water were other, that these things were produced from both self and other.
And then finally, the school which held the position of causeless production, this was Gangbaapa, and they refuted the, they did not accept the position of, they did not accept the doctrine of karma. They said that things simply arose by themselves, that they arose from no particular cause. They accepted causeless production. So it is by means of refuting these four extremes of production, these four, that we come to the position of the Consequentialist Middle Way school. These four, these extremes of production are assertions both of Buddhist and non-Buddhist schools.
So Nāgārjuna and Candrakīrti present extensive and varied reasons for refuting each of these possible modes of production, these four extremes of production. They refute with many types of reasonings the possibility of production from self. Then they go on and refute with various types of reasoning the possibility of production from others. Then they refute production from both self and others, and then they refute causeless production. Then they establish that if something were able to be produced it must be produced in one of these four ways.
Therefore, the fact that all four of these modes of production have been refuted, then nothing whatsoever can be truly existently produced. And we are able to make this determination in dependence upon reasoning set forth refuting these four extremes of production. So with respect to this first extreme of production, the extreme of production from self which was held by the Drangcharba, they assert that the sprout and the seed are of the same entity and the same nature, that the sprout exists at the same time as the seed. If one holds this position that the sprout and the seed are of the same entity, the same nature, and that the sprout exists at the time of the seed, then one is asserting production from self. But both Nāgārjuna and Candrakīrti refute this possibility in stating that the sprout and the seed are not the same nature, they are not the same entity, and the sprout does not exist at the time of the seed.
So if you were to think about this and were questioned, does the sprout exist at the time of the seed? What would you answer? Does the sprout exist at the time of the seed? So if you were to accept that the sprout and the seed were the same nature and that the sprout existed at the time of the seed, then you would be asserting production from self. So what do you think?
Does the sprout exist at the time of the seed? A better point with a question. Well, are the sprout and seed the same nature? Same entity. Same nature.
Same nature or same entity? Not just same. Same nature or same entity? Same nature? So maybe you could ask what do you mean by same nature?
What do you mean by same entity? So the sense of being same entity and same nature are the same. And what we mean by them are that other than the seed there’s no sprout. And other than the sprout there’s no seed. If two things are same entity, there’s no sprout which is other than the seed and there’s no seed which is other than the sprout.
For example, take this flower. In Tibetan language, flower is metok. So the metok is no other entity than the flower, and the flower is no other entity than the metok. They’re the same nature, they’re the same entity. There’s not a metok which is other than a flower, and there’s no flower which is other than a metok.
Same entity, same nature. So just as in the case where the flower and the metok, we can’t posit something which is a metok and is not a flower. And we can’t posit something which is a flower and not a metok. Likewise, if a seed and the sprout were one entity, the same entity or same nature, we could not posit a seed which was not a sprout or a sprout which was not a seed. But we can easily understand that the seed and the sprout are other than one another.
When we’re planting seeds in the field, there’s no sprouts at that time and no one would identify the seed as a sprout. On the other hand, once the crop has begun to grow, there’s a green shoot coming up, at that time there’s no seed and we can identify that object as a sprout. And therefore we can differentiate them, identify them as being different entities or having different natures. So the seed and the sprout have distinct identities and therefore do not have the same nature. In the case of the flower and the metok, we cannot distinguish between this is a flower and it’s not a metok, or this is a metok and it’s not a flower.
We cannot make that distinction as to an entity, that they’re different entities. In fact they’re the same entity. And therefore but in the case of the sprout and the seed, we can make that distinguishment. We can identify them individually as distinct, and therefore they are not the same entity. So we can go on to refute that the sprout and the seed are the same entities since their identities can be distinguished as distinct from one another, and additionally that the sprout does not exist at the time of the seed.
So Nāgārjuna and Candrakīrti use the reasoning that the seed and the sprout are not the same entity and that the sprout does not exist at the time of the seed in order to refute production from self. So merely what we’ve said thus far does not constitute a proof. We have to specify what faults would accrue if production from self did in fact exist. What faults would accrue? What faults would there be?
So yes. So if we were to ask just in general, is there any purpose? Is there any meaning? Is there any point for a plant to arise from a seed? And we said, well of course, because once a plant, once a sprout