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Concerning the statement by the First Panchen Lama Lozang-chökyi-gyeltsen in the root text, "Nevertheless, when examined by a yogi learned in scripture and logic and experienced [in meditation], their definitive meanings are all seen to come to the same intended point," some later Gelug masters have said that except for when the First Panchen Lama himself was alive and could explain himself, how can we understand that a view that relies on an affirming nullification (1) and one that relies on a non-affirming nullification (2) come to the same intended point? The Third Panchen Lama Pelden-yeshey had asked that when delivering a discourse on Mahamudra at Kumbum.
First of all, there must undoubtedly have been a special, uncommon tradition of discourse, transmitted from learned practitioners of the past, explaining their method of meditating on voidness in connection with their practice of Anuttarayoga tantra, that asserted and described like this, based on personal experience. Secondly, as we were discussing in terms of Dzogchen, we can speak of the nature of reality in terms of either devoid nature itself or that which has voidness as its nature. If we speak in terms of the latter, we arrive at an affirming nullification. Thus we can present primordial, simultaneously arising clear light mind as "other-voidness" (3) - it is devoid of everything other, namely it is devoid of all fabricating levels of mind and their mental fabrications, from the three unconscious, most subtle conceptual appearance-making minds of threshold, light-diffusion and appearance-congealment onwards. Primordial, simultaneous arising clear light mind of deep awareness, the foundation responsible for the appearance-making and appearance of everything of samsara and nirvana, is devoid in the sense of not being any of the coarser, fleeting levels, starting from the three most subtle conceptual minds. In the terminology of Nagarjuna's and Aryadeva's commentaries to Guhyasamaja, clear light mind is all-void. Since the fact that clear light ùind is a level of mind that is devoid of all fleeting levels, or devoid of being them, affirms that clear light mind is something else or something other than this, clear light mind, as other-voidness, is an affirming nullification.
When we speak of clear light mind as primally pure, we are refering to its devoid nature - its nature of being devoid of all fantasized and impossible ways of existing. Something's being devoid, from the depths, of any fantasized and impossible manner of existence as itsnature fulfills the definition of being a self-voidness - a voidness of a self-nature (4). When we go on to speak of clear light mind as also spontaneously establishing the apearance-making and appearance of all phenomena, we understand a type of other-voidness that is based on clear light mind's being primally pure, it combines the essence of the second and third rounds of transmission of Buddha's teachings - respectively, the teachings on discriminating awareness from the Prajñaparamita sutras and Buddha-nature from The Sutra on the Essential Factors for Accordant Progress (5). And because such presentation combines the second and third rounds of transmission, it has no fault.
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Some systems asserting other-voidness, however, do not combine Buddha's second and third rounds of transmission defined in this manner.
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Although this other-voidness position is not at all the same as the chittamatra view, it uses much of the same terminology but with different definitions. Of the three types of phenomena each having their own defining characteristics, dependent, or "other-powered" (6), and imputed, or "totally imaginary" (7) phenomena constitute the conventional level and are devoid of a self-nature. They arise dependently on unawareness as the first of the twelve factors that dependently arise. Thoroughly established phenomena (8), referring to clear light mind, are devoid in the sense of their being devoid of dependent and imputed phenomena, or devoid of being either of those two. They are an other-voidness. Since they do not arise from unawareness, they are beyond dependent arising.
Among those who define the two rounds of transmission in this way, there are some who totally denigrate the second round and take the third round to teach, in addition to Buddha-nature, that some phenomena do not exist at all, whereas others do. They take the lack of self-existence, or self-voidness - taught in the Prajñaparamita sutras to be equivalent to total non-existence - the position of nihilism. Consequently, dependent and imputed phenomena, being self-void, are totally non-existent.
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This is the inferior view of other-voidness. Even though it is called other-voidness, it is an extremely deficient and faulty assertion of other-voidness. Many learned and experienced masters from the sakya, Kagyü, Gelug and Nyingma traditions have refuted it. In taking voidness of a self-nature to be equivalent to total non-existence and dependent arising to mean arising dependently on unawareness, and asserting thoroughly established clear light mind as an other-voidness devoid of non-self-existence and this type of dependent arising, they are left with no alternative but that clear light mind is truly and inherently existent, existing through its own power, by virtue of itself. it is devoid not only of arising dependently on unawareness, but also of arising dependently by virtue simply of mental labeling.
Such assertion is clearly in total contradiction with what Nagarjuna has expounded. It basically contradicts the sutras.
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This is why these other-voidness proponents are logically forced to assert the second round of transmission as interpretable, not definitive. But even if we explain exclusively in terms of Maitreya's The Furthest Everlasting Stream (9), which they take as a source for their view, we find it difficult to be comfortable with their interpretation of how the ultimate or deepest level exists. How can truly and inherently existent thoroughly established phenomena be the source of non-existent impure phenomena that they are totally devoid of?
Sa Sainteté le Dalaï Lama, The Gelug/Kagyü Tradition of Mahamudra (Commentaire du "Mahamudra Racine" de Panchen Lobsang Tcheugyel, pp. 234 - 9).
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1. paryudasa-pratisheddha, faisant référence à une vacuité extrinsèque ou d'altérité (cf. 3)
2. prasajya-pratisheddha, faisant référence à la vacuité de soi (cf. 4)
3. Skt. parabhava-shunyata; tib. shèntong.
4. Skt. svabhava-shunyata; tib. rangtong.
5. Tathagatagarbhasutra.
6. Skt. paratantra; tib. shèn wang.
7. Skt. parikalpita; tib. kun tak.
8. Skt. parinispanna; tib. yong droup.
9. Uttaratantra Shastra. (notes perso).
Voilà qui répond à bien des interrogations soulevées récemment. J'essaierai de trouver le temps d'en faire une version française, tellement il est utile.
J'encourage une fois de plus la lecture de l'ouvrage entier, qui résout bien plus de doutes encore.
Amitié
Voici ce que dit Sa Sainteté le Dalaï Lama à ce sujet dans Le Sens de la vie (J'ai Lu, pp. 161-162):
Il est important de distinguer la claire lumière objectale (la vacuité au sens de la nature ontologique de toute chose) et la claire lumière sujet (la conscience qui réalise la vacuité).