The Conception of Buddhist Nirvāṇa

The main content of The Conception of Buddhist Nirvāṇa unfolds as a philosophical investigation into how Nirvāṇa was understood across the historical development of Buddhism. The early chapters examine preliminary issues surrounding the meaning of Nirvāṇa, Buddhism and Yoga, the position of later scholastic Buddhism, the double character of the Absolute, and the way different Buddhist schools interpreted extinction, immortality, causality, and liberation. Stcherbatsky then compares Buddhist concepts with related Indian philosophical systems, especially Vedānta, Sāṅkhya, Yoga, and Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika, in order to clarify how Buddhist thought positioned itself against both eternalism and annihilationism. The discussion proceeds through the transformation of Buddhist doctrine in Mahāyāna, where Nirvāṇa becomes increasingly linked with relativity, emptiness, universal compassion, the cosmic Buddha, and the philosophical rejection of substantial existence. A substantial part of the volume is devoted to Nāgārjuna’s treatment of relativity and the examination of Nirvāṇa, supported by Candrakīrti’s explanations, where questions of causality, non-origination, non-destruction, identity, difference, permanence, impermanence, existence, non-existence, and the relation between saṃsāra and Nirvāṇa are analyzed in detail. Through these materials, the book presents Nirvāṇa as a central philosophical problem: not merely a religious goal, but a key to understanding Buddhist theories of reality, knowledge, causation, emptiness, and liberation.