Chih-I and Madhyamika In this thesis a systematic comparative
study is made between Chih-i's thought and the Mādhyamika. The
study is a response to a basic problem that can be formulated as
follows. Indian Mādhyamika influenced the development of Chinese
Buddhism amply and deeply. Chih-i, the founder of the Chinese
T'ien-t'ai School, had a close relationship with the Mādhyamika
tradition textually and theoretically. However, in his
classification of the Buddhist doctrines, he regarded the
Mādhyamika as "Common Doctrine" and theoretically lower than his
"Perfect Doctrine". Here, then, are our questions: 1. Why is
Chih-i not satisfied with Mādhyamika thought? 2. Why does he
advocate the Perfect Doctrine? Our study shows that these
questions are mainly concerned with the understanding of Truth
and its realization. For Chih-i, the Mādhyamika Truth (termed
Emptiness or the Middle Way) lacked permanence, function and
all-embracing nature; the Truth explicated in the Perfect
Doctrine (termed the Middle Way - Buddha