Emptiness
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Emptiness (stong pa nyid): the ultimate nature of phenomena, namely their lack of inherent existence. The ultimate understanding of emptiness goes together with the spontaneous arising of boundless compassion for sentient beings. [MR]
Emptiness (stong pa nyid)
- In all Buddhist philosophical systems from Madhyamaka onwards, emptiness (Skt. śūnyatā) refers to the lack of inherent existence with respect to both mind and external phenomena. Its synonyms, therefore, include ultimate truth (Skt. paramārthasatya), actual reality (Skt. dharmata), and suchness (Skt. tathatā). The characteristic which mind and external phenomena lack, i.e. that which they are empty of, is that they do not exist independently from the cognizing awareness in dependence upon which they are perceived. When all levels of conceptual awareness dissolve and the relationship between subject and object is correctly recognised, the natural, non-dual dynamic space, which is regarded as the true nature of mind and external phenomena is revealed. Although the term is known also in the literature of the Lesser Vehicle, it is in the philosophical speculations of the Madhyamaka school that the different interpretations of emptiness were greatly elaborated. This school is named after the doctrine of the Middle Way (madhyamapratipad) which avoids the extremes of eternalism and nihilism, and which was expounded by Śākyamuni Buddha.There exist different views of emptiness within the Madhyamaka school—that of the Svātantrika who utilise independent syllogisms in proof of emptiness, that of the Prāsaṅgika who utilise the consequentialist logic of negation and reductio ad absurdum to destroy conceptual elaborations concerning emptiness, and that of the Great Madhyamaka which in the course of meditative insight distinguishes between the intrinsic emptiness of phenomena and the extrinsic emptiness of pure buddha attributes. In the sūtras of the Greater Vehicle, sixteen kinds of emptiness are differentiated, while in the tantras, four modes of emptiness are further clarified. See also under Madhyamaka. GD (from the Glossary to Tibetan Elemental Divination Paintings)