Vividness, Habit, and the Objects of a Buddha’s Action: Omniscience in the Tattvasiddhi and Its Dharmakīrtian Context

Abstract What is the role of mental construction ( vikalpa ) in a buddha’s awakening? The Tattvasiddhi , a Sanskrit Buddhist tantric work from the 9th century, answers that it is essential. A buddha’s omniscience itself, the work argues, is savikalpaka : it essentially involves mental construction. This is a surprising response given what we’re taught to expect from Buddhist sources about the non-conceptual nature of awakening. In this paper, I make sense of this response as part of a larger movement among post-Dharmakīrtian philosophers to understand the ways perception and perceptual vividness are conditioned by habit. In doing so, I show that the Tattvasiddhi is an especially clear case of a reconditioning model of the path, and I juxtapose this with deconditioning models found in both tantric and non-tantric sources.