There were not only linguistic and cultural differences between the interpretations of Buddhist logic in Ming-Qing period and their Indian original, but also the interruption of the Chinese tradition itself. A double gap in both space and time was so created, which had led to many misreadings by Ming-Qing scholars on Buddhist logic. For instance, in their interpretations of the example member, Ming-Qing scholars failed to understand the original structure of Dignāga's theory or inherit correctly the concepts of "essence" and "substratum" of the example member from Tang Buddhist logic, and even regarded the dissimilar example as a separate and contrasting argument. They removed the logical significance from the example statements, but applied a rhetorical interpretation, thus making the example member merely serve as an analogy by instances. However, such misreadings are not meaningless but to a certain extent self-contained, showing the theoretical construction efforts of Ming-Qing scholars in the face of unfamiliar texts. Through their particular interpretations, Ming-Qing scholars reconstructed the theories of Buddhist logic, and thus further localized Indian Buddhist logic. Therefore, their misreadings are actually not contrary to innovation, but presenting a typical case of transcultural communication.
