PROBLEMS OF LANGUAGE IN BUDDHIST TANTRAalternatives of "meaning" offer two different meanings for a single word.^18 It
follows that the alternatives of "word" offer different words--or systems of
words, bhiisa-for a single meaning. Although our reasoning is based upon
what may be an artificial symmetry in Tsmi.-kha-pa's titles, we think it will hold
in the following analysis. But we shall see also that the one meaning expressed
by both "twilight" and "nontwilight" language remains singular in only a
general way since a critical distinction lies within it.
In his article "Climactic Times in Indian Mythology and Religion," Wayman
discusses traditional India's perception of "climactic points in the temporal
flow when experience of time becomes so intense that time itself seems to
stop."^19 Supporting Eliade's description of "sacred time," it is claimed that
during such breaks in ordinary time the sage has the best opportunity to
break through himself from ordinary to supraordinary states.^20 Thus it is that
Gautama Buddha is said in the earliest Scriptures to have conquered Mara
at dusk and to have reached bodhi at dawn. We can see that ordinary time
ceases at these two moments in the precise sense that each "twilight" (saJ?Zdhii)
signals a "paradoxical place where the worlds of darkness and light intersect."^21
On the strength of this and research elsewhere of a more philological nature,
Wayman is able to translate saJ?Zdhii-bhasa as "twilight language"-a special
language created to express the "ambiguity, contradiction, or paradox of
the moment between darkness and light" as well as the ambiguity of the
states attained at such a time.^22 A telling passage is adduced from the non-
Tantric Saddharma-pm:u;larika: "And having heard this buddhadharma, I
thought 'Indeed, this is expressed in the manner of twilight; at the tree of
enlightenment the Jina reveals the knowledge that is inaccessible to logic,
subtle, and immaculate.' "^23
In close parallel-and incidentally continuing the earlier "Lotus" tradition-
Tsmi.-kha-pa comments in Guhyasamaja literature that the tantric goal is so
uncertain that "even the Tathagatas do not know" it.^24 Nevertheless, the chief
candidate of the Anuttara Yoga Tantra is to be instructed in this very goal, a
necessity that requires the expression of instruction to reflect uncertainty. The
"ambiguous discourse" (viruddhiiliipa) of"twilight language," then, functions in
precisely this way. Wayman is thus further able to reject other scholars' transla-
tions of saJ?Zdhii-bhasii as "secret language" or "intentional language," since
what cannot be known cannot be properly secret and what lacks certain meaning
cannot be said to intend a certain meaning beyond what the words suggest.^25 It is
interesting to note that Govinda-translating "twilight language" yet
representative of the position implied by the other translations-argues similarly
about "secrecy" when the problem is mantra. He states that its secrecy is "not
something that is hidden intentionally" but something esoteric only in the sense
of being acquired by "insight."^26 But let us recognize again that "twilight lan-
guage" does express meaning, albeit ambiguous meaning. In support of our
earlier analysis based upon titles of the pairs of alternatives, the tantric
Candrakirti states that a "truth of nature is revealed" (dharmatattvaprakiisanam).