Huifeng’s (aka Matthew Orsborn) book Old School Emptiness is the best existing critique of your view on this, which he refers to as “the Madhyamaka telos”. Unfortunately, OSE is still quite difficult to get hold of and then quite a demanding book to read once you have it. But if you are genuinely interested, then you should make the effort to get it and read it. I got mine directly from Matt. He’s back in Taiwan again, but no longer associated with Fo Guang Shan (who published OSE).
See also Huifeng’s translation of Yinshun’s An Investigation into Emptiness, from which he draws many of his observations.
There is an overview of the issue in my article, which I’m sure I have already recommended to you.
Attwood, Jayarava, (2022) “The Cessation of Sensory Experience and Prajñāpāramitā Philosophy” International Journal of Buddhist Thought and Culture 32(1):111-148. (PDF) The Cessation of Sensory Experience and Prajñāpāramitā Philosophy | Jayarava Attwood - Academia.edu
Suffice to say, that amongst the few of us who study Prajñāpāramitā literature at a professional level “the Madhyamaka telos” (i.e. your view) is considered a false trail created by Mādhyamikas themselves as part of a legitimisation strategy for their innovative doctrine which most Buddhists, including most Mahāyana Buddhists, wrote off as nihilistic.
Nāgārjuna never cites a Prajñāpāramitā text. Such sources as have been identified in his works are all Śravaka texts. MMK does not even mention the word prajñāpāramitā (just as Vajracchedikā does not mention the word śūnyatā). The assumption that the two are related in any way is entirely down to later Madhyamaka commentators and Tibetan reflexes of Indian mythology.
Part of the problem is that all the existing English translations of Prajñāpāramitā texts are firmly rooted in the Madhyamaka telos. And Conze is extremely misleading since on top of this he also has an agenda unrelated to Prajñāpāramitā or Buddhism, i.e. rejecting the foundations of Aristotelian logic in favour of magical thinking (this is explicitly stated in his pre-WWII publications and in his 1979 memoir).
So one cannot simply go to the existing translations to see what I’m talking about, one still has to read the literature in Sanskrit (which is difficult, tbh). For example, the existing English translation of Aṣṭa obscures the fact that half the verbs that Conze translates as “it doesn’t exist” actually mean “it is unknown”. Conze also obscures the fact that Subhuti, the voice of Prajñāpāramitā, never talks in terms of existence/non-existence. Rather, it’s Śāriputra, representing analytic approaches to liberation, who raises such metaphysical issues. Subhūti always tells him off for doing so.
Paul Harrison’s (2006) translation of the Gilgit/Bamiyan Vajracchedikā manuscripts is a helpful corrective to those who follow Conze (and D. T. Suzuki) in repudiating the law of non-contradiction, but doesn’t directly address the Madhyamaka telos.
This situation re translations may change soon. I heard a rumour that Anālayo might be working on a new translation of Aṣṭa or at least part of it. But I also know someone who has started a PhD on Aṣṭa (under Orsborn) which ought to result in a critical edition of Aṣṭa (for the first time) and translation.
Let’s keep in mind that the ostensible topic of this thread is the phrase that I coined, i.e. “the problem of action at a temporal distance”, referring to the historical antinomy between karma and dependent arising and the various solutions that emerged to try to bridge the gap without capitulating to eternalism. I raised the name of Nāgārjuna only because he too describes this problem, attributes solutions to his contemporaries, criticises those solutions (in rather vague terms), and goes on to offer his own solution. Most folks on this forum are Theravādins and focussed on Pāli texts. I don’t want to get too far into the weeds of Madhyamaka. Having demonstrated, contra your position, that Nāgārjuna actually does have views, I don’t see any point in continuing to discuss him or his followers.
For example, we haven’t spent any time discussing the solution adopted by the Theravāda (and Yogācāra), i.e. kṣanavāda. That would be more appropriate to this forum. Though again, I’m interested in finding explanations rather than just descriptions.
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