The precious garland and The song of the four mindfulnesses

Nagarjuna was an Indian pandit from Vidarbha in south India who lived approximately four hundred years after Buddha's death. At that time the Mahayana teaching had diminished, and Nagarjuna assumed the task of reviving it by founding the Madhyamika school of tenets. Here, in his Precious Garland, he clarifies the Buddha's exposition of emptiness based on the Perfoction of Wisdom Sii.tras (Prajnaparamita). He presents the ten Bodhisattva stages leading to Buddhahood based on the Sii.tra on the Ten Stages (DaJahhiimilca). He details a Bodhisattva's collections of merit and wisdom based on the Sutra Set Fortlz. hy Ak~ayamati (Ak~ayamatinirdesa). The Precious Garland was intended primarily for the Indian king Satavahana, therefore, Nagarjuna includes specific advice on ruling a kingdom. (The section on the undesirability of the body is written with reference to the female body simply because the king was a male. As Nagarjuna says, the advice should be taken as applying to both males and females.) Among his works, the Precious .Garland is renowned for extensively describing both the profound emptinesses and the extensive Bodhisattva deeds of compassion.