Ambiguity and the Concern with Language in the Traditions of Chinese Buddhist

Although technical terms often represent unambiguous meanings, the crucial expression �emptiness' in Mahāyāna Buddhist traditions is likely to serve a soteriological function. The doctrine of emptiness seems to be intended to detach our linguistic expression from the unwholesome influence of illusory assumptions; assumptions of which we are not aware in our referential acts. Buddhist texts often reveal our linguistic habits as the very root of inverse views inflicting unwholesome results on our existence. On the other hand, Buddhists also believe that there is a mode of expression which initiates the transformation from the unwholesome into the wholesome. It is a mode of expression which causes us to become aware of the falseness inherent to linguistic expression. Consequently, Mahāyāna traditions treat and utilize linguistic expression in an ambiguous way; that is not only as the source of the unwholesome but also as the very impulse initiating its transformation into the opposite. Since the teaching about �emptiness' is self-referential, the functioning of emptiness must shape the linguistic expression in those Buddhist texts expanding on this doctrine. The compositional pattern of these texts frequently displays an ambiguous feature. In some Chinese traditions, the ambiguous mode of linguistic expression received new inspirations from the very mark of the Chinese classical language itself � its mark of ambiguity. In my paper, I attempt to outline both the Mahāyāna Buddhist concern with language and the extent to which ambiguity in Chinese language may have inspired Chinese Buddhist thinkers in designing the compositional pattern of their texts. Since the doctrine of emptiness is a common foundation for all Mahayana teachings in China , my investigation intends to expose the Buddhist inclination to ambiguity as a major tendency in the traditions of various Chinese Buddhist schools.