how do you understand emptyness (shunyata)?

Vincenzi

do you agree with it? or do you have an alternate explanation?

Jeffrey

I understand it as a quality of awareness that we experience. For example when we are angry. It is passing anger. But the anger strangles us until we let go and turn towards the anger. To turn towards the anger and face it is to open. The quality of awarenss which allows us to open is none other than emptiness.

Vincenzi

honestly... it is another method to grasp the Dharma... almost a koan.

in context, while explaining trilaksana, it makes more sense.

Jeffrey

could you give a digest of trilaksana, I am not familiar

Vincenzi

trilaksana is the pali name for the three marks...

Paradox

Doesn't sunyata mean that everything is subjective? Nothing has any inherent meaning outside of what we project onto it. That's my understanding.

I agree with it. I'm not my mind/conditioning, and neither is anything else. It's all arbitrary.

Vincenzi

@Paradox

I have never tought of it that way, but it is interesting.

santhisouk

If I was new to Buddhism I would question this word heavily. But now emptiness to me just refers to something meaningless or lack of value. If somebody were to say "Living beings are alive". This statement is indeed empty. There is no value to it. Nobody will gain anything from this statement, but yet this statement is true. It is merely stating something that exists in nature. It is just this certain part of nature that this statement refers to that lacks value and is therefore empty. Other parts of nature that we should not cling to are also just as lacking in value, but we would have to see its true nature to really know its value.

SherabDorje

Emptiness, according to Buddhism, is just a type of natural law of existence. IMO, there is no alternative explanation. Nothing exists without interdependent origination, and any given phenomena is composed of constituent parts. It's so elementary as to be irrefutable.

zen_world

In Quantum mechanics they talk about the ocean of potentiality. Before an electron is observed, it is in superposition, meaning that it doesn't exist yet but has the potential to become into "existence". So, basically all things stay in this potential/probabilistic state until they are observed. See, this initial state, this probabilistic state, or this potentiality is the emptiness. It doesn't exists yet but it has the potentiality to become into existence.
If you having hard time to understand emptiness thru philosophy, I suggest look into quantum mechanics.

seeker242

I heard a Tibetan Rinpoche teacher once explain emptiness. I forgot his name but he said "Whatever you think emptiness is, that's not it"

IronRabbit

Surprisingly, matter is composed almost entirely of empty space.

This emptiness - this space in relation to matter - doesn't matter - so to speak.....

Shunyata points to anatta which points to annica. Trilaksana includes dhukka - where would we be without our ancient teacher - dukkha?

Emptiness seems like a goal as well as realm of existence and points to the lack of enduring identity of any phenomenon in a constant state of change.

The only thing one may expect is change - except from vending machines.....

Vajraheart

@Iron Rabbit

LOL! No kidding... sometimes not even the item purchased, or maybe the item is switched and you get something other than you ordered.

This is not the case with Buddhism. You get exactly what you put into it.

Jeffrey

"If I was new to Buddhism I would question this word heavily. But now emptiness to me just refers to something meaningless or lack of value. If somebody were to say "Living beings are alive". This statement is indeed empty. There is no value to it. Nobody will gain anything from this statement, but yet this statement is true. It is merely stating something that exists in nature. It is just this certain part of nature that this statement refers to that lacks value and is therefore empty. Other parts of nature that we should not cling to are also just as lacking in value, but we would have to see its true nature to really know its value."

My teacher says that we are on an intellectual understanding when we have the 'so what' feeling and ideation.

Jeffrey

I once kicked a machine and it came out. Another time I kept trying to make a bag of chips above fall down and knock the bag of chips but they just kept piling up.

taiyaki

i can eat pizza because pizza is empty. if it wasn't empty then it could never change. if it could never change it could not go into my mouth because it would exist independent from me in some outside reality that i cannot access.

thankfully the pizza only exists in relation to the makers of the pizza and the various parts that come together so i and our society can project pizza onto these parts.

COME INTO MY MOUTH NOW!

santhisouk

Indeed. The taste bud fetters. Probably one of the hardest attachments to overcome next to expensive clothes and fancy cars.

taiyaki

that and the female form.

Vincenzi

...as long as you are not actually hoping for an inmaterial rebirth (arupa dhatu).

aMatt

My teacher spoke of shunyata emptiness in terms of subjective view. For instance, we see a rock, but it is not a rock from its own side. We are the ones who actually own the label and construct the form, but then project it from our minds as though "that is a rock there".

It is actually empty of qualties, and that emptiness unifies all of the subjective views of sentient beings. Like the stage from which actors project meaning onto props and each other to carry out their roles. Without the projecting, it is empty.

Vincenzi

I don't think emptyness was supposed to reach so far, at the beginning of Buddhism.

Jeffrey

The prajnaparamita was stored by the nagas.

Nagarjuna, the great sage, logician and Ayurvedic physician from Southern India, was also connected to the Nagas, and at Samye Ling there is a golden statue of him with a cobra sheltering his head, seated on a coiled serpent throne. It is said that he was given the termas concerning the Prajnaparamita by the naga king, Nagaraja, who had hidden them in a lake - Nagas were traditionally able to hide termas. His name sounds as if it is linked to the Pandavan hero Arjuna, who had a son by the naga princess Ulupi), but this may be coincidence. There is also the connection of medicine with the serpent - think of the caduceus, or staff with two entwined snakes, and compare that to the vital channels in the body in Ayurveda and in Jewish kabala, where they entwine a central tree. Of course, snakes may be venomous, and the wise use of medicine may also use poisons in diluted form.

Similar to King Arthur and the lady of the lake.

Vincenzi

@Jeffrey

so, emptyness has less value because of how some text was "found"? (I don't see your point)

Jeffrey

I'm not sure where you got that it has less value from what I said :wtf:

Vincenzi

@Jeffrey

I was just guessing what you meant by that post...

Jeffrey

oh no I was just expressing a traditional tale how we came to have the current ideas of emptyness in modern buddhism. I guess the nagas guarded it. Not sure if that is symbolism?

Vincenzi

the nagas are mythological, not sure what (if any) meaning they have... probably something like protectors of certain teachings.

Jeffrey

the snake sheds off its old skin. which i think is like not grasping to old identities. the snake is also poisonous and wrong view of emptiness can lead to deadening of concern for the world.

NOTaGangsta

Emptiness is acceptance without judging. Space contains everything but does not judget or take preference.

However, not knowing whats wrong and right and pretending to be tolerant when your only indulging yourself is not a open mind that's empty!

mantra0

I think emptiness is about the true nature of physical world phenomena

objects like stones are flux of matters and energy and changes constantly.
the stones exist but not truly exist independently. I we see the stone with the concept "the stone" instead of what it really is, which is flux of ever changing matter and energy, we have the wrong view. That's my opinion on the meaning of emptiness.

Understanding things as not truly exist (as said above) helps us greatly to lessen attachment. Attachment tends to stick easily to conceptual view than something that's flux of ever changing components.

Vincenzi

@mantra0

do you think that emptyness is compatible with contemporary (quantum) physics? that it is a crucial concept, even for science, to understand how this so-called material world really is?

pegembara

Emptiness is equivalent to insubstantiality or anatta. The realisation of emptiness leads to dispassion. One is no longer "hooked" to one's perception and is thus freed from dukkha, effectively one is "in this world, but not of this world".

[ Now, as well as before, I remain fully in a dwelling of emptiness. Just as this palace of Migara's mother is empty of elephants, cattle, & mares, empty of gold & silver, empty of assemblies of women & men, and there is only this non-emptiness — the singleness based on the community of monks; even so, Ananda, a monk — not attending to the perception[1] of village, not attending to the perception of human being — attends to the singleness based on the perception of wilderness. His mind takes pleasure, finds satisfaction, settles, & indulges in its perception of wilderness.

"He discerns that 'Whatever disturbances that would exist based on the perception of village are not present. Whatever disturbances that would exist based on the perception of human being are not present. There is only this modicum of disturbance: the singleness based on the perception of wilderness.' He discerns that 'This mode of perception is empty of the perception of village. This mode of perception is empty of the perception of human being. There is only this non-emptiness: the singleness based on the perception of wilderness.' Thus he regards it as empty of whatever is not there. Whatever remains, he discerns as present: 'There is this.' And so this, his entry into emptiness, accords with actuality, is undistorted in meaning, & pure.]

Cula-suññata Sutta: The Lesser Discourse on Emptiness

Vincenzi

@pegembara

one of my favorite sutras

but... isn't that the arupa-jhana of emptiness?

mantra0

I think one example is that: physicality of Mr. A...
Mr A. of today looks the same like Mr. A two years ago,
but most of the body cells of Mr. A 2 years ago is replaced by new ones now and most water molecules in the body have changed.

conceptually, Mr.A is still Mr. A after 2 years, but they are no more truly the same. They already changed (impermenance) but our ignorant mind see them as the same person, when they are already physically very different.

I think that's emptiness as applied in daily life.

Julia

Emptiness means that everything is empty of independent existence. Everything is dependent on everything else to exist.

Julia

"I am, you are, every single thing, all selves and all things in existence are empty of an independent existence.

Therefore things are not independent.
Therefore things are dependent and interconnected.
All things are connected."

KarmaDondrupTashi

Emptiness is a skillful concept - but it's still just a concept. The real thing is the unity of voidness and compassion.

kc39850p

I understand it in the way the Dalai lama described it in his book about how to see oneself as one really is. That emptiness is the understanding that independent existences do not exist, and that everything is the product of causality, and doesn't really exist as we see it, because it is not complete, being constantly effected by the parts that make it up, but it still exists as a dependent arising. Meaning things exist because they have form and meaning, but do not exist in the way we think, because they lack any solidarity or independence. Nothing is unchanging, therefor nothing can be said to exist in it's own right, just as the sum of parts, which in and of themselves are the some of parts, which are the sum of parts before them. Like I do not exist independently, even if I stopped eating, stopped dressing, and stopped interacting with the world, because, firstly, I would still age, and so I would be impacted by time itself, and two, because me making those choices would stem from the idea that I want to be independent, which that idea would be dependant on the situations that led me to that conclusion. That is how I understand it anyway. But then again, I am not the type for faith, and this might be me trying to make sense out of a concept still above me...

SeaOfTranquility

That's kind of a hard one to describe in words. We are so use to only observing form we just ignore or avoid emptiness.

Emptiness the nature of everything that exists. Unconditioned and infinite.

Everything that exists, meaning has form (be it me, things, phenomena, or even thoughts) is empty of a separate and permanent self. All form is impermanent and only arises dependent on multiple other events in a process that can never be seen or understood completely. This can be expressed as Form=Emptiness and is taught conceptually as Dependent Origination and No Self.

Emptiness is thought of as non-existence. But something has to come from somewhere. Emptiness is the source of all things (form) that comes into existence. As such form and emptiness are not opposites any more than light and dark are opposites.

In the world of form - Dependent Arising is the process, Impermanence and No Self are the qualities, and emptiness is the source.

In a practical way awareness is manifestation of emptiness.