Contributed by: Thomas Cattoi, Jesuit School of Theology at Santa Clara University
Lama Tsong kha pa (1357-1419), from the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive
May everyone, both human and non-human, who helps support
The cultivation of the excellent path and helps clear away the obstacles,
Never be separated through all their lives
From the perfect path praised by the Buddhas.
For my part, when I strive to engage in the supreme vehicle
Through the manifold activities of dharma practice,
May I always be aided by those who are powerful,
and may the ocean of goodness pervade all directions.’
Thus ends the Great Treatise on the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment (Byang chub lam rim chen mo) by Tsong kha pa (1357-1419), arguably the most important philosophical treatise in the history of Tibetan Buddhism. Replete with references to countless authorities to different strands of Buddhism from early Theravada to Indian Mahāyāna and beyond, the Great Treatise is not merely a work of speculative reflection: it is -first and foremost – a reference work for practitioners of the dharma, charting a map towards the achievement of liberation. For Tsong kha pa, nirvanic reality emerges out of right view and right action; Buddhist practice entails the pursuit of wisdom and the practice of compassion.
In the years between 1716 and 1720, the Italian Jesuit Ippolito Desideri visited Tibet, living largely in Lhasa, but also visit numerous other monasteries at holy sites, many of whom still exist today. After mastering the Tibetan language, Desideri spent a few months at the monastery of Sera, just outside Lhasa, where he became familiar with the Madhyamaka philosophy of the Gelug tradition. As he tells us in his Relazione, Desideri encountered and was soon fascinated by the writings of Tsong kha pa, whose Great Treatise was one of the foundational works in the Gelug intellectual patrimony. Desideri translated the text into Italian, with the intention of writing a commentary. When the Dzungar invasion and the subsequent arrival of a Chinese military garrison led to his flight from Tibet in 1720, Desideri took the translation with him, but this text was unfortunately lost. After returning to Italy, Desideri spent his last few years fighting with the Congregation De Propaganda Fide to return to Asia, but was never able to realize his dream.
During my doctoral studies, I encountered the figure of Tsong kha pa, and explored his understanding of Buddhahood in conversation with the Christian notion of incarnation, drawing in particular on the figure of Maximos the Confessor. After encountering the figure of Desideri and attending an international conference on his legacy held in 2018 in his native town of Pistoia, I went back to the Great Treatise and decided to try and write a commentary to this text from a Christian perspective for the series of Christian commentaries on non-Christian texts edited by Catherine Cornille. Some members of the Society of Buddhist-Christian Studies have already published commentaries in this series, such as John Keenan’s 2011 I am /No Self: A Christian Commentary on the Heart Sutra, Leo Lefebure’s and Peter Feldmeier’s joint 2011 work Path of Wisdom: A Christian Commentary on the Dhammapada. More recently, Perry Schmidt-Leukel published a massive commentary to Śāntideva’s Bodhicaryāvatāra that foregrounded echoes between this foundational text and the vision of the Pauline corpus.
My goal in this commentary is to try and do something slightly different from these previous works. As Tsong kha pa’s intention in the Great Treatise is to outline, and offer an intellectual rationale for a whole speculative and spiritual school of thought, I decided to juxtapose his insights with those of another comprehensive tradition- that of the Philokalia of the Eastern Fathers. The Philokalia -an anthology of spiritual texts from the Eastern Christian tradition ranging from the fourth to the fifteenth century that was published in 1786 and was enormously influential in Russia and Eastern Europe- offers a comprehensive, if not necessarily systematic approach to the Christian spiritual life, grounded in the monastic experience of the Christian East that has been preserved on Mount Athos. Desideri, who was trained at the Roman College, had probably had very little exposure to the tradition of the Greek fathers; his extant apologetic writings appear to draw on the Scholastic tradition that would have informed his training. In my view however, the Philokalia’s sensitivity is closer to the Great Treatise than to the Medieval Summae, despite Tsong kha pa’s and Aquinas’ shared habit to cite extensively from texts of the broader tradition. The legacy of the Christian East may be less ‘systematic’ than the Great Treatise, but it shares its transformative thrust and its understanding of the spiritual trajectory as a path that comprises a contemplative dimension -the pursuit of theōria or wisdom- as well as a more practical aspect -the practice of the virtues or the paramitās. For the Eastern Fathers, the goal is a Christocentric deification; for Tsong kha pa it is the achievement of awakening following the teaching of the Buddha.
We can leave the last words of St. Nikodimos, one of the compilers of the Philokalia:
“for love unites those who have been divided and is able to create a single identity of will and purpose, free from faction, among many or among all; for the property of love is to produce a single will and purpose in those who seek what pertains to it”
