 After completing his Golden Garland in 1388–89, Tsongkhapa spent a period of some ten years removed from the hub of intellectual activity. He engaged in meditation and ritual religious exercises in Southern Tibet (Lho kha) where, as evidenced in his short autobiographical writing from this transitional period (Thurman 1982), and corroborated by traditional sources (Kaschewsky 1971, Vostrikov 1970), he resorted to a communion or dialogue with Mañjuśrī––the iconographic representation of perfect knowledge in the Buddhist pantheon. Through the voice of Mañjuśrī he articulated a hierarchical system of philosophies culminating in what he characterized as a pristine, Middle Way, *Prāsaṅgika-madhyamaka (Tib. dBu ma thal 'gyur pa) that avoided over-reification (of the absolute) and over-negation (of the conventional).