Emptiness

General discussion, particularly exploring the Dharma in the modern world.
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tomschwarz
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Re: Emptiness

Post by tomschwarz »

imagine a circle closes back in on itself, and yet was not broken. those are the two truths.
i dedicate this post to your happiness, the causes of your happiness, the absence of your suffering the causes of the absence of your suffering that we may not have too much attachment nor aversion. SAMAYAMANUPALAYA
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Rick
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Re: Emptiness

Post by Rick »

Sorry, I don't get it. Try again? :-)
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Rick
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Re: Emptiness

Post by Rick »

Malcolm wrote:
rachmiel wrote:Here's something I don't quite get:

Form is emptiness. No problem with that. Form is clearly empty of ... (svabhava).

But:

Emptiness is form. Hmm ... that's confusing. I grok "is empty of." But "emptiness" as a subject/noun, not so much, because it seems to want to reify "being empty." Does EiF mean anything nontrivially *different* from FiE? If so, what?
Just a minor correction to the translation you are using, it should be:
  • "Matter [the material aggregate] is empty (adjective). Emptiness (noun) is matter [one to one identity]. [Therefore] there is no matter apart from emptiness; there is no emptiness apart from matter."
The same goes for the rest of the five aggregates, as it is said:
  • Likewise, sensation, perception, formations and consciousness are empty...That being so, all phenomena are emptiness, signlessness, not arising, not ceasing, neither tainted nor free from taints; neither increasing nor decreasing.
That distinction is clarifying, thanks. I did a search for both versions, and the first (Form is emptiness) had more than 10x the number of hits as the second (Form is empty)!
So, it is an identity proposition about the nature of reality. But it is not really a proposition, since the sūtra says that this analysis is a training. A training in what? A training in seeing that the five aggregates, all contaminated phenomena are empty of a svabhāva, an inherent nature.
Okay, it's a training, meaning (I assume) it is not meant to be taken literally, rather as a "poetic license" pointer.

But I still don't get it. Matter and emptiness seem categorically different. To say "Emptiness is matter" sounds like saying something like "Existence is body." (Not meant to be a literal translation, rather an example of the mix of two categorically different terms.) It does not compute!
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Malcolm
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Re: Emptiness

Post by Malcolm »

rachmiel wrote: Okay, it's a training, meaning (I assume) it is not meant to be taken literally, rather as a "poetic license" pointer.

But I still don't get it. Matter and emptiness seem categorically different. To say "Emptiness is matter" sounds like saying something like "Existence is body." (Not meant to be a literal translation, rather an example of the mix of two categorically different terms.) It does not compute!

It is a training meant to lead one to understand that all phenomena do not arise and do not cease.

It has exactly the same meaning as the mangalaṃ of the Nāgārjuna's MMK.

Emptiness is matter, matter is empty means there is no matter to find that is not empty, and no emptiness to look for apart from matter.

The result of looking for matter, is that it is not found ultimately. It is a mere empty appearance.
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tomschwarz
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Re: Emptiness

Post by tomschwarz »

"all humans deserve to be happy"
next
a child of 4 years has just died
next
a 36 year old man is carefully crafting a self serving and political message

now that is hard to accept and is not quite right, hence the idea that all is not one, not amorphous. but the roughness in the texture of those concurrent things, each piece of roughness is an illusion based on life as we know it (a.k.a rebirth)

there we can imagine segmemts closing into a circle. but the realization of illusion, in this case, is a circle that was never broken, e.g. the logic of cause and effect, the wisdom of discernment, the true accomplishment (6 perfections), the wisdom of sameness, the vastness of reality's expanse, etc....
i dedicate this post to your happiness, the causes of your happiness, the absence of your suffering the causes of the absence of your suffering that we may not have too much attachment nor aversion. SAMAYAMANUPALAYA
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Rick
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Re: Emptiness

Post by Rick »

Umm ... errrrrrr ... maybe I kind of have an inkling of what you mean. Which is fine, I like inklings.
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Lukeinaz
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Re: Emptiness

Post by Lukeinaz »

If form is empty it must be empty of something. Maybe this something is how the form exists.

Maybe when you understand form to be empty you are just using a concept. So in a way, as soon as you think of this emptiness you have just created a form?
Lukeinaz
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Re: Emptiness

Post by Lukeinaz »

edit, The quality of being empty of something is how form can exist.

I read a while back a commentary about this line that stated to some effect:

A rose is not a rose; thats what makes it a rose.

Thats always stuck with me. But I am sure my limited understanding is miles off
Triquetra of Columba
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Re: Emptiness

Post by Triquetra of Columba »

Lukeinaz wrote:If form is empty it must be empty of something. Maybe this something is how the form exists.

Maybe when you understand form to be empty you are just using a concept. So in a way, as soon as you think of this emptiness you have just created a form?
:thumbsup:

The apprehended and apprehender that appear to the imagination, the dependent consciousness, are not established, nor do they exist the way they appear. Like the perspective of high and low in a painting or a cairn that appears to be a person, they are purely imaginary and have no essence of their own. Therefore, that emptiness, the absence of apprehended and apprehender, is thoroughly established. It exists here, in the imagination, the dependent consciousness, as its intrinsic nature.
Mipham
Lukeinaz
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Re: Emptiness

Post by Lukeinaz »

The Two Truths seem to fit nicely. Any references out there?
EIF= Ultimate Truth
FIE= Relative Truth
muni
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Re: Emptiness

Post by muni »

muni wrote:
Let it be.
I got this question on a tread which is now closed. And it can have a place here, I think.
What are you getting at? "Let it be"?
Not that I have an answer but...
Very good to learn from own delusions, at least so for me. It can go easy to lose awareness and then the spectacle starts. Many, many posts on this forum already explained dependency-emptiness in many ways. How we react on fabricated dharma, on others, all these having no any existence on their own, and are dependent on our mind. Still it is easy to forget that and see entities/real existing phenomena apart from own grasping mind, which we then give colours by our ideas, as we project our own reactions, our own limitations. We then enjoy our own right pleasure-feelings, or we enjoy our own irritations as those what doesn’t fit us.
Looks like there are as much worlds as there are sentient beings. I guess, to practice recognize own clinging prevents suffering-harming reactions.

Let it be.

“Sentient beings, self and others, enemies and dear ones—all are made by thoughts. It is like seeing a rope and mistaking it for a snake. When we think that the rope is a snake, we are scared, but once we see that we are looking at a rope, our fear dissipates. We have been deluded by our thoughts. Likewise, mentally fabricating self and others, we generate attachment and aversion.” ~Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche
Malcolm
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Re: Emptiness

Post by Malcolm »

Lukeinaz wrote:If form is empty it must be empty of something.
Yes, a form (an object of the eye) is empty of an essence.
Schrödinger’s Yidam
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Re: Emptiness

Post by Schrödinger’s Yidam »

Malcolm wrote:
Lukeinaz wrote:If form is empty it must be empty of something.
Yes, a form (an object of the eye) is empty of an essence.
My current understanding is that it appears temporarily and without definitive facticity. It's not reliable or certain.

But my understanding undergoes change too, so it's not reliable either.
1.The problem isn’t ‘ignorance’. The problem is the mind you have right now. (H.H. Karmapa XVII @NYC 2/4/18)
2. I support Mingyur R and HHDL in their positions against lama abuse.
3. Student: Lama, I thought I might die but then I realized that the 3 Jewels would protect me.
Lama: Even If you had died the 3 Jewels would still have protected you. (DW post by Fortyeightvows)
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