Chapter 9. Investigation of the Prior Existent

Some assert: the one to whom seeing, hearing and the rest, and also feeling and the rest, belong exists before them.

For how could seeing and the rest belong to one who does not exist? Therefore before them there must be established an existent to whom they belong.

pūrvapakṣin wrote:

before them there must be established an existent to whom they belong

That existent which is established before seeing, hearing and the rest, and before feelings and the rest — by what, then, is it known?

And if it is established even without seeing and the rest, then they too, without doubt, will exist without it.

Someone is revealed by something, and something is revealed by someone — how then can there be someone without something, how can there be something without something?

Before all of them — seeing and the rest — no “someone” exists; rather he is revealed through one of them at one time, and through another at another time.

If he does not exist before all of them — seeing and the rest — how can he exist before each one of them separately?

If the one who sees is the very same as the one who hears and the very same as the one who feels, then he would have to exist before each one of them separately — and that does not hold.

But if the one who sees is one, the one who hears is another, and the one who feels is yet another, then the hearer would exist at the time when the seer exists, and a multiplicity of “selves” would follow.

Seeing, hearing and the rest, and also feeling and the rest — in those elements from which they arise he does not exist either.

And if the one to whom seeing, hearing and the rest, and also feeling and the rest, belong does not exist, then they themselves do not exist either.

The one who exists neither before seeing and the rest, nor together with them, nor after them — with regard to him the notions “is” and “is not” cease.