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Nagarjuna is the philosopher of emptiness, probably of the second century, founder of the Madhyamaka school and the most influential thinker in Buddhism after the Buddha, revered across Mahayana as a bodhisattva. His argument in the Mulamadhyamakakarika is that nothing has independent existence, emptiness included, and that this is not nihilism but the condition of anything being able to change at all. Legend has him retrieve the Perfection of Wisdom sutras from the naga serpents, who had kept them until the world was ready to receive them. Which of the many works bearing his name are by one man is unresolved, and several of them are certainly later than he is.
Facts
Belief
TheologyNon-theistic: no creator god is central 4 History
Historical NoteWhich of the many works bearing his name are genuinely by one man is unresolved, and several of them are certainly of later date than he is. 1 Disputed
Origin of the NameNagarjuna joins naga, serpent, with arjuna, a name also carried by the arjuna tree. 1 The naga element is traditionally explained by the legend that he retrieved the Perfection of Wisdom sutras from the serpent king's realm, but this is the hagiographic account handed down about him rather than a settled philological derivation of the name, and it is presented here as tradition, not as established etymology. Attestation
Era of Attestation Era of Attestation2nd century CE (probable) 1 Veneration TodayActively venerated in a living tradition 1 Cult
Attributes and IconographyNagarjuna is often pictured with a canopy of naga serpent hoods rising behind his head, an image tied to the legend of the serpent king who kept the Prajnaparamita texts safe until he came to receive them. 1 Function
Domain / Function Attributions
Mythic AssociationFounding philosopher of the Madhyamaka, or Middle Way, school of Mahayana Buddhism, traditionally credited with retrieving the Prajnaparamita sutras from the realm of the nagas, serpent beings said to have kept them safe. 1 Status
Scholarly Standing DetailScholars distinguish the historical second century philosopher Nagarjuna, founder of the Madhyamaka school, from later tantric figures who wrote under the same name centuries afterward, a distinction sometimes obscured in traditional hagiography that treats all the works as one author's. 3 Learn More
The Philosopher of Emptiness
Nagarjuna, who probably lived around the second century CE, is the founder of the Madhyamaka (Middle Way) school and by wide agreement the most influential Buddhist thinker after the Buddha himself, revered across the Mahayana traditions as a bodhisattva and sometimes called a second Buddha. His central work, the Mulamadhyamakakarika (Fundamental Verses on the Middle Way), sets out with relentless logical rigour the doctrine of emptiness (shunyata): the teaching that nothing whatever possesses an independent, self-existent nature, that all things arise only in dependence on other things and on conditions, and that this holds even of the categories the Buddhist tradition itself had come to treat as ultimate. His method is not to assert a positive metaphysics of his own but to take up each proposed way that things might exist, as caused, as uncaused, as one, as many, as arising, as ceasing, and to show that each collapses into contradiction, so that all fixed positions dissolve.
The Two Truths, and the Retrieval of the Sutras
The point of this dismantling is not nihilism, a misreading Nagarjuna explicitly rejects, but freedom: to see the emptiness of all things is to loosen the grasping that binds beings to suffering. He is famous for the teaching of the two truths, a conventional truth, on which ordinary language, causation and the practice of the path all validly operate, and an ultimate truth, in which no thing is found to have inherent existence, and for the striking further claim that emptiness itself is empty, not a hidden absolute standing behind appearances but simply the absence of independent existence, so that emptiness and dependent arising are two ways of saying the same thing.
Around the historical thinker gathered legend, most famously the story that Nagarjuna descended to the undersea realm of the nagas, the serpent-beings, and brought back the Perfection of Wisdom sutras, which the Buddha was said to have entrusted to them until the world was ready. Whatever the history, the tale marks his role as the one who brought the teaching of emptiness fully into the light. His thought is foundational for the Madhyamaka of Tibet and for the Chan and Zen, Tiantai and other traditions of East Asia.
Correspondences & Relations
Cross-Tradition Connections
Associated With
This source names Nagarjuna directly: "by the sculptor Tsapa Namgyal, depicts Nagarjuna, the second century Indian philosopher whose writings founded the Madhyamaka ("Middle Way") school of Buddhist thought."
This source names Nagarjuna directly: "on the Madhyamaka school founded by Nagarjuna, its doctrine of emptiness, and how it avoids both eternalism and nihilism."
Legend has Nagarjuna retrieve the Perfection of Wisdom Sutras from the naga serpents, who had kept them until the world was ready to receive them.
Belongs to Tradition
Traditions Founded
Worshipped In
In the Other Atlases
- Also in Philosophy Atlas: Nagarjuna, the same subject.
Sources
1. The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism
Robert E. Buswell Jr. and Donald S. Lopez Jr., Princeton University Press, 2014s.v. Nagarjuna; Madhyamaka, emptiness and the two truthsView the Source 2. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Edward N. Zalta and Uri Nodelman (eds.), Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, 2024Life and WorksQuote, Life and Works
That Nagarjuna was a Buddhist monk who lived some time between 150 and 250 CE, probably mainly in southern India, is rarely disputed.
2. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Edward N. Zalta and Uri Nodelman (eds.), Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, 2024Traditions Founded: Madhyamaka, https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/nagarjuna/View the Source 2. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Edward N. Zalta and Uri Nodelman (eds.), Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, 2024Belongs to Tradition: Buddhism, https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/nagarjuna/View the Source 3. The Foundations of Buddhism
4. An Introduction to Buddhism: Teachings, History and Practices, 2nd edition
Mahayana Buddhism: The Doctrinal Foundations
Paul Williams, Routledge, 1989On Nagarjuna and the Perfection of Wisdom literature
Encyclopedia of Religion
Mircea Eliade (ed.); Lindsay Jones (ed., 2nd ed.), Macmillan Reference, 2005View the Source Reader Challenges (0 open reader challenges)
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