WEBVTT 00:00:02.484 --> 00:00:06.484 < Introduction to Buddhism I > 00:00:06.591 --> 00:00:10.171 What is the Meaning of “Emptiness”? 00:00:10.509 --> 00:00:12.869 Hi everyone. 00:00:12.869 --> 00:00:17.479 Sorry, raising a question in such a large group makes me a little nervous. 00:00:17.479 --> 00:00:19.089 So, please bear with me. 00:00:20.136 --> 00:00:24.136 The question that I have relates to the concepts of emptiness. 00:00:24.379 --> 00:00:27.459 Emptiness has come up in a few of your Dharma talks, 00:00:27.459 --> 00:00:30.397 your videos and textbooks a few times. 00:00:30.397 --> 00:00:33.307 It also comes up in many of the traditional texts 00:00:33.307 --> 00:00:36.147 and Sutras like Diamond Sutra, Heart Sutra. 00:00:36.147 --> 00:00:40.707 Whenever I read through what emptiness means in the Buddhist concept 00:00:40.707 --> 00:00:44.707 it leaves me a bit more confused 00:00:44.707 --> 00:00:48.707 and sometimes a little bit dampened and slightly demotivated. 00:00:49.772 --> 00:00:53.772 The reason is because the way I understand it is very shallow. 00:00:55.652 --> 00:00:58.662 I understand it as because of the impermanence 00:00:58.662 --> 00:01:03.919 because of the causality being dependent on each other, 00:01:03.919 --> 00:01:06.646 things become empty or things are empty. 00:01:07.179 --> 00:01:11.325 But my challenge and difficulty with understanding the concept is 00:01:12.178 --> 00:01:17.682 how do I approach it so that I'm not undermining what is important in life 00:01:17.682 --> 00:01:23.942 for instance family relationships that matter, ambitions that matter. 00:01:29.516 --> 00:01:32.556 That's my question. 00:01:37.465 --> 00:01:55.065 So the emptiness, we usually express that using the Chinese character 00:01:55.065 --> 00:01:58.555 for me is not filled, right empty. 00:01:59.838 --> 00:02:22.488 But as you know how a word is interpreted really depends on the context 00:02:22.488 --> 00:02:25.228 of what came before and what follows after. 00:02:25.228 --> 00:02:28.618 So the same word actually means multiple things. 00:02:29.531 --> 00:02:55.193 But for example, if you claim that this word can only mean one thing, 00:02:55.193 --> 00:03:01.483 then that's different. But what emptiness really refers to is that one word 00:03:01.483 --> 00:03:05.488 can mean multiple things depending on the context. 00:03:05.488 --> 00:03:06.933 That's what emptiness means. 00:03:07.801 --> 00:03:23.462 So emptiness in this context does not mean a complete absence 00:03:23.462 --> 00:03:26.017 of something or a complete void. 00:03:26.017 --> 00:03:29.512 It really means that everything is contextual, 00:03:29.512 --> 00:03:35.457 depends on the context of how those words or what definition that word belongs to. 00:03:37.680 --> 00:03:51.516 So let's take an example. So somebody may look at you 00:03:51.516 --> 00:03:57.097 and claim that you are a good person. 00:03:57.097 --> 00:04:00.367 Another person may look at you and say you are a bad person. 00:04:01.116 --> 00:04:11.984 So when somebody claims that you're a good person 00:04:11.984 --> 00:04:16.588 that means that Joe, you have an essence of goodness in you. 00:04:17.282 --> 00:04:24.332 And if somebody says you're a bad person 00:04:24.332 --> 00:04:29.072 then you have something within you that, that person is perceived as bad. 00:04:30.897 --> 00:04:48.699 So whether you have a bad factor or a good factor 00:04:48.699 --> 00:04:55.137 that's something that's intrinsic to you. Then that's the opposite of emptiness. 00:04:56.996 --> 00:05:16.656 But what emptiness refers to is that it's all about that person's perception 00:05:16.656 --> 00:05:22.126 as being good, or that person's perception as being bad. 00:05:22.126 --> 00:05:27.096 But there's nothing intrinsic within you that's good or bad. 00:05:28.211 --> 00:05:57.535 So in other words, you don't have an essential kind of form or an element 00:05:57.535 --> 00:06:01.050 or an attribute within you that somebody can point to 00:06:01.050 --> 00:06:03.465 and say that's good or that's bad. 00:06:03.465 --> 00:06:09.825 It is just their perception of you in that space and time context 00:06:09.825 --> 00:06:13.225 in which they claim that you are good or bad. 00:06:13.978 --> 00:06:27.786 So in that case when somebody says you are a bad person or you're a good person. 00:06:27.786 --> 00:06:31.597 Then I can say that she is neither good nor bad. 00:06:31.597 --> 00:06:33.357 She is just, she is empty. 00:06:35.600 --> 00:06:49.234 So that in that case empty doesn't means that you don't exist, 00:06:49.234 --> 00:06:52.954 that there's nothing, or there's just a void. 00:06:52.954 --> 00:06:58.924 It just means that there's no attribute within you, 00:06:58.924 --> 00:07:03.414 or an essence within you intrinsically that we can call as good or bad. 00:07:05.197 --> 00:07:09.627 Say we have this thing. 00:07:09.837 --> 00:07:27.323 Somebody actually ate a little bit of this thing and got healed. 00:07:27.323 --> 00:07:31.110 And so that person said 'Okay this is a great medicine’. 00:07:31.380 --> 00:07:40.805 But somebody else actually ate the same thing and then actually got sick. 00:07:40.805 --> 00:07:47.190 And that person pointed the same thing and said that's poison. 00:07:48.203 --> 00:07:55.843 So is this thing medicine or poison? 00:07:57.522 --> 00:08:00.862 There are three things. 00:08:00.862 --> 00:08:04.512 One is 'This is medicine', 00:08:04.512 --> 00:08:07.252 and one 'This is poison'. 00:08:07.252 --> 00:08:15.713 The third is that it has medicinal properties or it has poisonous properties. 00:08:16.794 --> 00:08:25.558 But this thing itself is empty. 00:08:26.457 --> 00:08:35.197 That means that it neither has toxic properties nor medicinal properties. 00:08:36.716 --> 00:08:43.166 That means that this is just the thing. 00:08:43.807 --> 00:08:55.912 But in whatever context and situation, this thing has been applied to 00:08:55.912 --> 00:09:00.580 sometimes has medicinal attributes or sometimes it has toxic attributes. 00:09:03.230 --> 00:09:17.313 So that's when you use the word empty or Gong (공) to refer to that 00:09:17.313 --> 00:09:23.601 this is neither medicinal nor toxic, you are neither good nor bad person. 00:09:24.708 --> 00:09:45.628 So all existence whether that's biological a thing or non biological organic 00:09:45.628 --> 00:09:49.553 or even a thought, a mental phenomena 00:09:49.553 --> 00:09:53.498 and it's just empty it's neither good nor bad. 00:09:54.657 --> 00:10:00.937 And it is just what it is. 00:10:01.504 --> 00:10:05.141 So that's why we call it or label it as empty 00:10:05.141 --> 00:10:08.124 because that's the truth it is what it is. 00:10:08.465 --> 00:10:40.895 However that thing how it's represented or manifest really depends on the situation 00:10:40.895 --> 00:10:45.165 the context and the connections in which it is allowed to manifest. 00:10:45.165 --> 00:10:50.390 So in some situations, you are a person in some situations, you're a bad person. 00:10:50.390 --> 00:10:55.929 In some situations this thing is a medicine in other it is a poison. 00:11:02.968 --> 00:11:14.681 So when we say Gong (공) the empty, 00:11:14.681 --> 00:11:19.268 that is kind of what a thing is what a phenomenon is. 00:11:19.268 --> 00:11:24.533 But however it's represented within the context or situation 00:11:24.533 --> 00:11:28.040 it finds itself in and that is what we call Form. 00:11:29.398 --> 00:11:40.483 Therefore if you really truly understand that all essence of all existence 00:11:40.483 --> 00:11:43.738 is really empty then there's no cause for you to suffer. 00:11:44.088 --> 00:11:51.358 Because you realize the person is neither bad nor good. 00:11:52.258 --> 00:12:05.374 That doesn't mean that person does not exist. 00:12:05.514 --> 00:12:10.804 That just means that the person in this situation in this space and time context 00:12:10.804 --> 00:12:16.004 under this specific set of conditions may appear to be good or bad to me. 00:12:21.077 --> 00:12:27.537 Doesn't look like you are fully clear on that. 00:12:29.523 --> 00:12:35.623 I am thinking of how you mention good or bad sometimes is empty. 00:12:35.623 --> 00:12:40.048 At the same time I can't help to think of historical dictators 00:12:40.048 --> 00:12:42.993 that have caused a lot of hurt. 00:12:43.320 --> 00:12:47.264 But also at the same time I have in my head explained to myself 00:12:47.264 --> 00:12:50.700 that they have violated the precepts. That's all. 00:12:59.478 --> 00:13:11.628 So even the precepts themselves are empty. 00:13:23.148 --> 00:13:29.760 I guess I am still a little confused about the precepts being empty. 00:13:29.760 --> 00:13:31.293 Do you mean they are dependent 00:13:31.293 --> 00:13:38.060 on the historical age we're in the society that we're in? 00:13:47.733 --> 00:14:06.132 There's no ethical precepts that we can absolutely say that this is the truth. 00:14:06.132 --> 00:14:10.662 That this is the way regardless of the situation and time and space 00:14:10.662 --> 00:14:16.262 that we find ourselves in, because that actually is a very dangerous path. 00:14:17.432 --> 00:14:53.212 So what Buddha taught us that the proper way the right way 00:14:53.212 --> 00:14:58.582 is always determined by the space and time of the situation that we are under. 00:14:59.156 --> 00:15:02.513 It's basically setting a compass down in a new place and seeing 00:15:02.513 --> 00:15:06.226 where it points north and that's when you find the right way. 00:15:06.226 --> 00:15:07.731 So everything is dependent 00:15:07.731 --> 00:15:12.186 even though the proper path on that, that's the middle way. 00:15:12.186 --> 00:15:17.956 And the concept of that middle way as it transition over to Mahayana Buddhism, 00:15:17.956 --> 00:15:21.356 it became translated or understood as emptiness. 00:15:22.363 --> 00:15:26.363 So the emptiness, the concept and the words, actually was a criticism against Theravada kind of rigid traditionalism in which they claimed that a certain set of ethical constructions was the way. 99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999 And so the criticism in Mahayana against that was that the construct should be empty. 99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999 So basically the original criticism which Theravada's rigid absoluteness of the way wast hat there is no fixed way and that eventually got translated and kind of consolidated into the word emptiness. 99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999 Basically when someone claims that this the truth, then the criticism is that there's' nothing that you can point to and say that's the absolute truth and that got translated into that sense of emptiness. 99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999 So the fact that we misunderstand emptiness or the concept because of the word that we use in space, but it's only a part of all. 99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999 We usually obsess over somebody else, if we like that person. 99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999 And we want to make that person behave the way we want them to behave. 99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999 So if they don't behave accordingly then we feel bitter. 99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999 And if that disappointment becomes too much then we just let go, and we become indifferent to them. 99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999 If we realize this concept of emptiness then we can actually let go of our obsession. 99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999 Then we can allow him or her to behave as they want. 99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999 If they ask for our help, Then we help. 99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999 If they don't ask for help, then we don't help. 99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999 99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999 So we're neither indifferent in this case nor obsessive.