This thesis is a comparative study of the approaches to mental tranquility advanced by the Pyrrhonian skeptic Sextus Empiricus and Huineng, the historically recognized Sixth Patriarch of the Southern Zen School. Relying on the Outlines of Pyrrhonism and the Platform Sūtra of the Sixth Patriarch, the principle texts of the Pyrrhonian and Zen schools respectively, I argue that the Pyrrhonian skeptic’s method of attaining ataraxia (“unperturbedness”) via the use of opposing arguments is essentially identical to that of the Sixth Patriarch Huineng’s employment of “opposition pairs.” Finally, in addition to contextualizing the schools historically, I compare their respective positions on ethical and metaphysical statements.

Chinese Primary Sources
I follow Yabuki Keiki’s original 57-chapter division convention when citing the Platform Sūtra. Quotations from the Ming Canon edition are cited in accordance with the Taishō Canon convention. I have consulted the English translations listed below. However, translations from the Chinese texts quoted in this thesis are my own unless otherwise noted.

卍 Xuzangjing Vol. 24, No. 460 (Jingangjing kou jie 《金剛經口訣》)

Chan, Wing-tsit. A Sourcebook in Chinese Philosophy. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963.

Ge zhaoguang 葛兆光, shiyi 釋譯. Zutang ji. 祖堂集. Gaoxiong (高雄): Foguang chu ban she 佛光出版社, 1997.

Katsuki, Sekida and A.V. Grimstone, ed., trans. Two Zen Classics. The Gateless Gate and Blue Cliff Records. Boston: Shambhala, 2005.

Price, A.F., and Wong Mou-Lam, trans. The Diamond Sutra and the Sutra of Huineng. Boulder: Shambhala, 1969.

Suzuki, D.T., trans. Lankavatara Sutra. Boulder, CO: Prajña Press, 1978.

Taishō Tripitaka Vol. 8, No. 223 (Mohe bore boluomi jing 《摩訶般若波羅蜜經》)

Taishō Tripitaka Vol. 48, No. 2008 (Liuzu dashi fabao tanjing 《六祖大師法寶壇經》)

Thurman, Robert A. F., trans. Vimalakirti Nirdesa Sutra. Penn: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1976.

Wudeng huiyuan 五燈會元. Beijing: Zhonghua shu ju 中華書局, 1984.

Yampolsky, Philip B., trans. The Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch. New York: Columbia University Press, 1967.
---. ed., trans. The Zen Master Hakuin: Selected Writings. New York: Columbia University Press, 1971.

Yang Zengwen楊曾文. Xinban Dunhuang xinben: Lizu tanjing新版敦煌新本: 六祖壇經. Beijing: Zong jiao wen hua chu ban she宗教文化出版社, 2001.

Greek and Latin Primary Sources
Quotations from the Outlines of Pyrrhonism are mainly adapted from Mate’s translation. The translations of Annas and Barnes and Bury have also been consulted.

Annas, Julias, and Jonathan Barnes, eds., trans. Outlines of Pyrrhonism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.

Bett, Richard, trans. Sextus Empiricus: Against the Logicians. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005.

Cicero, De Natura Deorum; Academica. Translated by H. Rackham. Cambridge: Harvard University Press (Loeb Classical Library), 1972.

Diogenes Laertius, The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers. Translated by C.D Yonge. London: Henry G. Bohn, 1853.

Eusebius of Caesarea, Praeparatio Evangelica (Preparation for the Gospel). Translated by E.H. Gifford. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1903.

Mates, Benson. The Skeptic Way: Sextus Empiricus’s Outlines of Pyrrhonism. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996.

Plato, The Apology. Translated by Benjamin Jowett. New York: Random House, 2001.

Sextus Empiricus, Against the Physicists, Against the Ethicists. Translated by R.G. Bury. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1936.
---, Outlines of Pyrrhonism. Translated by R.G. Bury. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1933.

Secondary Sources (Chinese and English)
Abe, Masao. Zen and Western Thought. Edited by William R. LaFleur. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1985.
Albert, Hans. Treatise on Critical Reasoning. Translated by Mary Varney Rorty. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985.
Annas, Julias, and Jonathan Barnes. “Doing Without Objective Values: Ancient and Modern Strategies.” In Norms of Nature. Edited by M. Schofield, et. al. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986.
---. The Modes of Scepticism: Ancient Texts and Modern Interpretations. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1985.
Barnes, Jonathan. The Toils of Scepticism. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990.
Barrett, Timothy H. “Arthur Waley, D. T. Suzuki and Hu Shih: New Light on the ‘Zen and History’ Controversy.” Buddhist Studies Review 6, no. 2 (1989): 116-121.
Benesch, Walter. An Introduction to Comparative Philosophy. Palgrave: New York, 2001.
Bett, Richard. Pyrrho, His Antecedents, and His Legacy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.

Bielefeldt, Carl, and Lewis R. Lancaster. “T’an Ching (Platform Scripture).” Philosophy East and West 25, no. 2 (1975): 197-212.

Brennan, Tad. Ethics and Epistemology in Sextus Empiricus. New York: Garland, 1999.
Brunschwig, Jacques. “Pyrrhonism.” In A Companion to Ancient Philosophy. A Companion to Ancient Philosophy, edited by Mary L. Gill and Pierre Pellegrin. West Sussex: Blackwell, 2006.
Burnyeat, Myles. “Can the Sceptic Live His Scepticism?” In Doubt and Dogmatism, edited by M. Schofield, M. Burnyeat, and J. Barnes. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980.
Chatterjee, Dipankar. “Skepticism and Indian philosophy.” Philosophy East and West 27, no. 4 (1977): 195-209.
Cheng, Chung-Ying. “Relativity and Transcendence in the Platform Sutra of Hui-Neng: On Polarities and their Philosophical Significances.” Journal of Chinese Philosophy 19 (1992): 73-80.
Conze, Edward. “The Ontology of Prajnaparamita.” Philosophy East and West 3, no. 2 (1953): 117-129.

de Botton, Alain. Status Anxiety. London: Penguin, 2005.
DeLacy, Philip. “Ou Mallon and the Antecedents of Ancient Scepticism.” Phronesis 3 (1958): 59-71.
Dumoulin, Heinrich, S.J. The Development of Chinese Zen after the Sixth Patriarch in the Light of the Mumonkan. Translated by Ruth Fuller Sasaki. New York: The First Zen Institute of America, 1953.
---. Zen Buddhism: A History Vol. 1, India and China. Macmillan Publishing, New York, 1994.
Faure, Bernard. Chan Insights and Oversights: An Epistemological Critique of the Chan Tradition. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993.
---. “The Theory of One-Practice Samâdhi (i-hsing san-mei) in Ch'an Buddhism.” In Traditions of Meditation in Chinese Buddhism, edited by Peter N. Gregory, 99-128. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1986.
Flintoff, Everett. “Pyrrho and India.” Phronesis 25 (1980): 88-108.

Floridi, Luciano. Sextus Empiricus, The Recovery and Transmission of Pyrrhonism. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002.

Fogelin, Robert J. Pyrrhonian Reflections on Knowledge and Justification. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994.

Forman, Robert K.C. Mysticism, Mind, and Consciousness. New York: State University of New York Press, 1999.

Frede, Michael. Essays in Ancient Philosophy. New York: Oxford University Press, 1987.

Fung Yu-lan. A History of Chinese Philosophy. 2 Vols. Translated by Derk Bodde. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1952-53.
---. A Short History of Chinese Philosophy. New York: Macmillan, 1948.
Garfield, Jay. “Epoche and `Suunyataa: Skepticism East and West.” Philosophy East and West 40, no. 3 (1990): 285-307.
Garfield, Jay, and Graham Priest. “Nagarjuna and the Limits of Thought.” Philosophy East and West 53, no. 1 (2003): 285-307.

Garner, Dick. “Skepticism, ordinary language and Zen Buddhism.” Philosophy East and West 27, no. 2 (1978): 165-181.

Garner, Richard. Beyond Morality. Temple: Philadelphia, 1994.

Graham, A.C. Disputers of the Tao. Illinois: Open Court, 1989.
Gregory, Peter N., ed. Sudden and Gradual: Approaches to Enlightenment in Chinese Thought. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1988.
---. Tsung-mi and the Sinification of Buddhism. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991.
Guo Peng 郭朋. Tan jing xiao shi. 壇經校釋. Taibei (台北): Wen jin chu ban she文津出版社, 1995.
Hadot, Pierre. What is Ancient Philosophy. Harvard: Cambridge, 2004.
Hankinson, R.J. The Sceptics. New York: Routledge, 1995.
Hong Xiuping 洪修平. Zhongguo chan xue si xiang shi. 中國禪學思想史. Nanjing: Zhongguo ren min da xue chu ban she 中國人民大學出版社, 2007.

Hookway, Christopher. Scepticism. London and New York: Routledge, 1990.

Hu Shih. The Development of the Logical Method in Ancient China. 2nd edition. New York: Paragon Book Reprint Corp., 1963.
---. “Ch'an (Zen) Buddhism in China: Its History and Method.” Philosophy East and West 3, no. 1 (1953): 3-24.
---. “The Development of Zen Buddhism in China.” The Chinese and Political Science Review 15, no. 4 (1932): 475-505.

Huppert, Felicia A. “Positive emotions and cognition: developmental neuroscience and health perspectives.” In Affect in Social Thinking and Behavior, edited by Joseph P. Forgas. New York: Psychology Press, 2006.
Jiang Lansheng, ed. 100 Excerpts from Zen Buddhist Texts. Taipei: Commercial Press, 2001.
Jin Ronghua 金榮華. Liu zu tan jing zhong Huineng ci mu qing jie shi bian 六祖壇經中「慧能辭母」情節試辨. Dunhuang xue di er shi wu ji 敦煌學第二十五輯 (2004.7): 227-231.

Jørgensen, John J. Inventing Hui-neng, the sixth Patriarch: Hagiography and biography in early Ch’an. Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 2005
Kjellberg, Paul. Phillip J. Ivanhoe. Essays on Skepticism, Relativism, and Ethics in the Zhuangzi. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1996.
Kraft, Kenneth, ed. Zen: Tradition and Transition: A Sourcebook by Contemporary Zen Masters and Scholars. New York: Grove Press, 1988.
Kuzminski, Adrian. Pyrrhonism: How the Ancient Greeks Reinvented Buddhism. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2008.
Lai, Whalen and Lewis R. Lancaster, eds. Early Ch'an in China and Tibet. Berkeley Buddhist Studies Series. Berkeley: Asian Humanities Press, 1983.
Long, A.A., and D. N. Sedley. The Hellenistic Philosophers. 2 Vols. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988.
McEvilley, Thomas. The Shape of Ancient Thought: Comparative Studies in Greek and Indian Philosophies. Allworth Press: New York, 2002.

McGreal, Ian P. ed. Great Thinkers of the Eastern World. New York: Harper-Collins, 1995.
McRae, John R. “The Ox-head School of Chinese Ch'an Buddhism: From Early Ch'an to the Golden Age.” In Studies in Ch'an and Hua-yen, Edited by Robert M. Gimello and Peter N. Gregory, 169-253. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1983.
---. Seeing Through Zen: Encounter, Transformation, and Genealogy in Chinese Chan Buddhism. Berkeley & Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2003.
---. “Shen-hui and the Teaching of Sudden Enlightenment in Early Ch'an Buddhism.” In Sudden and Gradual, edited by Peter N. Gregory, 227-278. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1988.2
---. “The Story of Early Ch'an.” In Zen: Tradition and Transition, edited by Kenneth Kraft, 125-139. New York: Grove Press, 1988.
Popkin, Richard H. The High Road to Pyrrhonism. Edited by Richard A. Watson and James E. Force. San Diego: Austin Hill Press, 1980.
---. The History of Scepticism from Erasmus to Spinoza. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1979.

Priest, Graham. Beyond the Limits of Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge, 1995.

Qui Minjie 邱敏捷. Tan jing de zuo zhe yu ban ben—yin shun yu hu shi ji Riben xue zhe xian guan yan jiu zhi bi jiao. 壇經的作者與版本—印順與胡適及日本學者相關研究觀點之比較. Di liu jie “Yinshun dao shi si xiang zhi li luan yu shi jian” xue shu hui yi: Yinshun dao shi yu ren pusa xing,” 第六屆 『印順導師思想之理論與實踐』學術會議：印順導師與人菩薩行 (2006.5): 1-38.

Rahula, Walpola. What the Buddha Taught. New York: Grove Press, 1974.

Reale, Giovanni, A History of Ancient Philosophy: 3. The Sys¬tems of the Hellenistic Age. Edited and translated by John R. Catan. Al¬bany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1985.

Red Pine. The Platform Sutra: The Zen Teaching of Huineng. Emeryville, CA: Shoemaker and Hoard, 2006.

Ren Jiyu. “A Brief Discussion of the Philosophical Thought of the Chan Sect.” Chinese Studies in Philosophy 15, no. 4 (1984): 3-69.

Reps, Paul, and Nyogen Senzaki, comps. Zen Flesh, Zen Bones: A Collection of Zen and Pre-Zen Writings. Boston: Tuttle, 1998.
Scharfstein, Ben-Ami. A Comparative History of World Philosophy: From Upanishads to Kant. New York: State University of New York Press, 1998.
Schlütter, Morten. “A Study of the Genealogy of the Platform Sûtra.” In Studies in Central and East Asian Religions 2 (1989): 53-114.
---. “Transmission and Enlightenment in Chan Buddhism Seen Through the Platform Sūtra (Liuzu tanjing 六祖壇經).” Chung-Hwa Buddhist Journal 20 (2007): 379-410.
Shen-yen. “The Platform Saatra of the Sixth Patriarch.” Translated by Yu Chun-fang. Chung-Hwa Buddhist Journal 5 (July 1992): 319-340.
Shi Ru-chan 釋如禪, bian編. Liu zu tan jing yan jiu六祖壇經研究. Beijing: Zhongguo da bai ke quan shu chu ban she 中國大百科全書出版社, 2004.
Sinnot-Armstrong, Walter, ed. Pyrrhonian Skepticism. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004.
Solomon, Robert. Continental Philosophy Since 1750. New York: Oxford University Press, 1988.

Stough, Charlotte. Greek Skepticism: A Study in Epistemology. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1969.

Suzuki, D.T. An Introduction to Zen Buddhism. New York: Grove Press, 1993.
---. Essays in Zen Buddhism. New York: Rider and Company, 1949.
---. The Zen doctrine of No-Mind: The Significance of the Sutra of Hui-neng (Wei-lang). London: Rider & Co, 1986.

Tiles, J.E. Moral Measures: An Introduction to Ethics West and East. Routledge: London, 2000.

Wright, Dale S. Philosophical Meditations on Zen Buddhism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.
Wu, John C.H. The Golden Age of Zen: Zen Masters of the T'ang Dynasty. Taipei: National War College, 1967.
Wu Ping 吳平. Chan zong zu shi—Huineng 禪宗祖師—慧能. Nangchang: Jiangxi ren min chu ban she 江西人民出版社, 1995.
Yanagida, Seizan. “The Li-tai fa-pao chi and the Ch'an Doctrine of Sudden Awakening.” trans. Carl Bielefeldt. In Early Ch'an in China and Tibet, edited by Whalen Lai and Lewis R. Lancaster, 13-49. Berkeley Buddhist Studies Series. Berkeley: Asian Humanities Press, 1983.
Yang Huinan 楊惠南. Huineng 惠能. Taibei (台北): Dong da tu shu gong si, 東大圖書公司, 1993.
Yin Shun 印順. Zhongguo chan zong shi cong Yindu chan dao Zhonghua chan. 國禪宗史—從印度禪到中華禪. Taibei (台北): Zheng wen chu ban she 正聞出版社, 1983.
Zeuschner, Robert B. “The Concept of Li-nien (“being free from thinking”) in the Northern Line of Ch'an Buddhism” In Early Ch'an in China and Tibet, edited by Whalen Lai and Lewis R. Lancaster, 131-148. Berkeley Buddhist Studies Series. Berkeley: Asian Humanities Press, 1983.
Zhang Yuanxia 張源俠. Dang liu zu hui neng yu jian fo luo y ide: nie hua wei xiao. 當六祖慧能遇見佛洛伊德: 拈花微笑. Taibei (台北): Di guo wen hua chu ban she帝國出版社, 2006.