"Even the gods envy those who are awakened and not forgetful, who are given to meditation, who are wise, and who delight in the repose of retirement (from the world)." ~The Dhammapada, Chapter XIV, The Awakened Caveat Lector: The 2nd century Indian sage Nagarjuna founded Mahayana Buddhism by establishing the archetype of the Bodhisattva—whose selflessness and compassion surpassed the Hinayana Arhat—but misconstrued the Buddha's most ambiguous teaching of tathata (suchness), inextricably tying the salvational Vehicle to a deadly doctrine of emptiness. Stemming from Advaita Vedanta, the Hindu school of non-duality, Nagarjuna's misperception of Buddhism further "refined" the primary tenets of maya (illusion) to claim that even Brahman (the Supreme Being) was a misnomer. Composing the Prajnaparamita Sutra in 8,000 Lines to reflect his own complete denial of any true Reality, Nagarjuna’s Madhyamika (Middle Way) teachings of sunyata (emptiness) infected the very core of the noble new philosophy, Mahayana.

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