Hi there, Marsha --
On Sat. 12/17/2011 at 2:13 PM, Marsha V [email protected] wrote:
[Quoting Nagarjuna, previously]:
"Two thousand five hundred years ago, the Buddha was able to realise
"emptiness" (s. sunyata). By doing so he freed himself from
unsatisfactoriness (s. dukkha). From the standpoint of enlightenment,
sunyata is the reality of all worldly existences (s. dharma). It is the
realisation of Bodhi — Prajna. From the standpoint of liberation, sunyata
is the skilful means that disentangle oneself from defilement and
unsatisfactoriness. The realisation of sunyata leads one to no attachment
and clinging. It is the skilful means towards enlightenment and also the
fruit of enlightenment."
This too is very interesting...
"Emptiness too, does not exist by way of its own being, as it is without
an essential nature. Emptiness is an absence, not an essence. When a
person discovers that what he or she thought existed does not, the
realization is a stunning absence. We think that things correspond to
their appearance and exist in this same way. We take objects to be exist
as their own things, including the self of persons and when such
identity, when the establishment of true entities cannot be found, its
absence is astonishing."
Interesting as they may be, I feel the need to disabuse you of the "truths"
you have been promulgating to the Pirsigians. This isn't a personal
rebuke, for I know you mean well, and I can well understand the appeal these
Mahayana teachings have for you. But in addition to the fact that they are
inconsistent with the Quality thesis and so will continue to provoke the
loyalists, they are simply not a source of wisdom or knowledge about
reality. I think I can convince you of this by analyzing the assertions
that constitute Mahāyāna doctrine.
First, let's establish the "conventional" meaning of the term "emptiness".
The synonyms are 'vacant', 'blank', 'void' or 'vacuous', and the dictionary
definition is: "lacking contents, especially of usual or normal contents."
In other words, emptiness is the absence of discrete objects or finite
entities. Yet Nagarjuna says Emptiness is not an essence. How does he know
that?
According to Wiki: "The two truths doctrine holds that truth exists in
conventional and ultimate forms, and that both forms are co-existent. Some
schools hold that the two truths are ultimately resolved into nonduality as
a lived experience and are non-different. "Ultimate truth" is unknowable,
however. The doctrine is an especially important element of Buddhism and
was first expressed in complete modern form by Nāgārjuna, who based it on
the Kaccāyanagotta Sutta." But, as D.T. Suzuki points out, "Without a
theory of cognition, Mahayana philosophy becomes incomprehensible."
"Within the Mahāyāna presentation, the two truths may also refer to specific
perceived phenomena instead of categorizing teachings. Conventional truths
would be the appearances of mistaken awareness--the awareness itself when
mistaken--together with the objects that appear to it. To put it another
way, a conventional truth would be the appearance that includes a duality of
apprehender and apprehended and objects perceived within that. Ultimate
truths, then, are phenomena free from the duality of apprehender and
apprehended."
But since all knowledge is acquired by the "apprehender" from what is
"apprehended", it cannot be "free from this duality"; therefore, we cannot
know that what we experience as "emptiness' (nothingness?) is devoid of
essence. Alexander Berzin (2007) says, "All knowable phenomena must be
members of the set of either one or the other true phenomena, with nothing
knowable that belongs to either both or neither of the sets. Consequently,
understanding the two truths constitutes understanding [the nature of] all
knowable phenomena." This is humanly impossible. The universe is not
empty, and Absolute Truth remains unknowable.
The Wiki article goes on to say: "During meditation, emptiness is
experienced as non-conceptual and without subject-object duality. However
emptiness teachings resist reification, turning this absence back into an
independent essence. And so it is said that emptiness too, is empty.
Emptiness is not the substance of phenomena, not its “filler,” substratum or
indicative of the absence of all phenomena. Emptiness is not an independent
entity, but is inseparable from form and countless dependent conditions,
though all empty ones."
So, dear Marsha, while it is nothingness ("emptiness", if you prefer) that
differentiates objects and entities in experiential existence, we cannot
conclude that nothingness is the ground of existence, but only that it is a
necessary contingency of our relational world. Moreover, to repeat myself,
nothing comes from nothingness, which should intuitively suggest that the
Primary Source (i.e., ultimate Reality) is "full" (as Eckhart taught) rather
than "empty" as Nagarjuna implies.
Again, I'm not trying to put down Buddhism and there's nothing personal
intended. However, if you think about the assertions you are accepting as
"truths" in any logical context, I believe you will see they are flawed
tenets unsuitable for the development of a metaphysical cosmology -- Eastern
or Western.
Enjoy the Christmas holiday, and all the best in 2012.
Ham, the Essentialist
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