Dharmapala of Nalanda

Dharmapāla (traditional Chinese: 護法, pinyin: Hùfǎ) (530-561 CE). A Brahmin[1] Buddhist scholar, he was one of the main teachers of the Yogacara school in India. He was a contemporary of Bhavaviveka (清辯, c. 490-570 CE.), with whom he debated.[2]

Xuanzang, the famous Chinese pilgrim, tells that Dharmapāla was born in Kanchipuram, Tamil Nadu. He was a son of a high official, and betrothed to a daughter of the king, but escaped on the eve of the wedding feast, entered the order, studied all views,[3] from Hinayana as well as Mahayana, and attained to reverence and distinction. He studied in Nalanda as a student of Dignāga. Later he succeeded him as abbot of the University. He spent his last years near the Bodhi tree, where he died.[4]

Dharmapāla developed the theory that the external things do not exist and consciousness only exists. He explains the manifestation of the phenomenal world as arising from the eight consciousness.[5]

Through the teachings of his disciple Silabhadra to Xuanzang, Dharmapāla’s tenets expanded greatly in China.[6] His works survive in Chinese translations.

References

  1. ↑ P. 293 India - A Travel Guide By Dr. B.R. Kishore, Dr. Shiv Sharma
  2. ↑ Williams, Paul (1989) Mahayana Buddhism. The doctrinal foundations. London: Routledge, p.88
  3. ↑ Beal, Samuel (2001) Life of Hiuen-Tsiang , Routledge, pp 138-9
  4. ↑ Lusthaus, Dan (2002) Buddhist phenomenology, a philosophical investigation of Yogacara Buddhism. Routledge, Chap. Fifteen, p. 395
  5. ↑ Swati Ganguly, Xuanzang, et al (1992) Treatise in thirty verses on mere consciousness , Motilal Banarsidass , p.11
  6. ↑ Williams, P.,id. p.88
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