/lit/ - Literature

>>14102921
>>14102928

Nagarjuna, as buddhist, didn't consider the Upanisads as truthful or correct. His influence comes from Canon Pali and mahayana sutras, sucha as Saddharma Pundarika Sutra and Vimalakirti.You must understand that many terms shared in common between buddhism, vedantisn (hinduism) and even jainism have different meanings and are used in different context. In buddhism, all things in our reality, even dhamma itself, are considered impermanent. It doesn't mean that it couldn't exist an ultimate reality such as Bhraman. That said, in buddhism, the access to this ultimate reality is not the ultimate ascetic transcendence. As all things are impermament, it's not you that have a life, it's life that has you. You're merely a paratisic set of sensation, feeling, volition and perception. This set is empty of an essence, so there is no soul, and thus, no "I" (Anatta). Bhraman is another matter, dealt by Buddha himself in Majjhima Nikaya, when, in Brahmanimantanika Sutra he meets Bhraman in his eternal court. There, Buddha is able to identify that even Brahman is a victim of the illusions of Mara, once Brahman believes he's ultimate. Buddha refutes Brahman when tells that while he is and he is not, and, as Buddha, he reached the non-conditioned, he is able to not be free from samsaric-wheel, while Brahman is condened to be, Brahman cannot not be. As Buddha said "I saw fear in being and non-being, not desiring any being did not hold with interest anything". For us, mere mortals, unable to be nor to not-be, there is no other higher path than the buddhic, which could be resumed as said by the Buddha's last words: all component things in the world are changeable. They are not lasting. Work hard to gain your own salvation. Nagarjuna was the one who gave greater colaboration into the explanation of pratītyasamutpāda (dependent origination), but term doesn't make sense for hinduism since anatta is not part of Advaita's understanding of reality, since it's opposed to atman. I'm not sure however, if there's an intrinsic opposition between anicca and brahman. I'm inclined to think that Buddha considered brahman as that of an ultimate decoy of samsara, thus being a not perfect trascendence.