There’s more than one way to be a non-dualist. This talk will focus on two different strategies adopted by the great Yogācāra polymaths of the 11th century, Ratnākaraśānti and Jñānaśrīmitra. Both agree that subject-object duality is to be overcome. This false distinction is at the root of our idea of self and our suffering in saṃsāra, and so overcoming it is essential to reaching buddhahood. But Ratnākaraśānti and Jñānaśrīmitra propose different reasons for this distinction’s being false—which in turn lead to different pictures of why we experience duality in the first place, what the liberative experience of non-duality consists in, and the nature of non-duality itself. Ratnākaraśānti advances what we can call a fission non-dualism: for him, with the dissolution of all possible objects of experience—all “appearances” or “mental images” (ākāra)—the subject-side goes, too, and just the sheer luminosity (prakāśa) of awareness shines forth. Jñānaśrīmitra, meanwhile, advances a fusion non-dualism: on his view, with the halting of determination (adhyavasāya), there is the shining forth of variegated appearance (citrākāra) in its indissoluble unity with luminosity. In this talk, I’ll examine their respective reasons for advancing these two opposed non-dualisms and consider the implications of these positions for both philosophy and buddhology.

Davey K. Tomlinson, PhD. is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Villanova University. His research is centered on late Indian Buddhist philosophy, focusing on epistemology and philosophy of mind in Dharmakīrti and his followers, Buddhist tantra, and debates about buddhahood and transformative experience. He is currently completing a monograph, What Is It Like To Be A Buddha? Indian Buddhist Philosophy After the Tantric Turn, as well as a book in collaboration with Nilanjan Das and Catherine Prueitt, Prajñākaragupta On What Exists.