Reson Sixty

This volume offers English translations of two major treatises from the Middle Way (Madhyamaka) school of Indian Buddhist philosophy. The first is the Reason Sixty by Nagarjuna, the most important thinker of the tradition, who lived in the 2nd century CE. The second is the commentary on it by his most influential successor, Chandrakirti, of the 7th century CE, whose work still carries great weight in Tibetan Buddhist educational institutions.

Both texts rely on the non-foundationalist reasoning for which Madhyamaka is famous, and here they apply it to universal compassion, a central Buddhist concern. In doing so they show that wisdom and compassion, two basic components of Indian Buddhist thought, are nondual. Chandrakirti's commentary brings out the full force of Nagarjuna's verses.

The translator, Joseph Loizzo, is a Harvard-trained psychiatrist and Columbia-trained Buddhologist who is known as a scholar of contemplative science. He explains how the two treatises bear on the linguistic turn in contemporary philosophy and stresses their practical, therapeutic potential. He pays particular attention to the close resonances between Chandrakirti's commentary and the later work of Wittgenstein, and his cross-cultural analysis shows how philosophy can transform those who engage with it.