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< Introduction to Buddhism I >

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What is the Meaning of “Emptiness”?

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Hi everyone.

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Sorry, raising a question in such a 
large group makes me a little nervous.

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So, please bear with me.

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The question that I have relates 
to the concepts of emptiness.

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Emptiness has come up 
in a few of your Dharma talks,

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your videos and textbooks a few times.

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It also comes up in many of the traditional texts

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and Sutras like Diamond Sutra, Heart Sutra.

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Whenever I read through what emptiness 
means in the Buddhist concept

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it leaves me a bit more confused

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and sometimes a little bit dampened 
and slightly demotivated.

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The reason is because the way 
I understand it is very shallow.

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I understand it as because 
of the impermanence

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because of the causality being 
dependent on each other,

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things become empty or things are empty.

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But my challenge and difficulty 
with understanding the concept is

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how do I approach it so that I'm not 
undermining what is important in life

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for instance family relationships 
that matter, ambitions that matter.

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That's my question.

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So the emptiness, we usually express 
that using the Chinese character

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for me is not filled, right empty.

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But as you know how a word is interpreted
really depends on the context

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of what came before 
and what follows after.

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So the same word actually 
means multiple things.

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But for example, if you claim that 
this word can only mean one thing,

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then that's different. But what emptiness 
really refers to is that one word

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can mean multiple things
depending on the context.

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That's what emptiness means.

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So emptiness in this context 
does not mean a complete absence

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of something or a complete void.

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It really means that 
everything is contextual,

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depends on the context of how those words 
or what definition that word belongs to.

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So let's take an example.
So somebody may look at you

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and claim that you are a good person.

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Another person may look at you 
and say you are a bad person.

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So when somebody claims 
that you're a good person

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that means that Joe, 
you have an essence of goodness in you.

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And if somebody says you're a bad person

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then you have something within you that, 
that person is perceived as bad.

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So whether you have a 
bad factor or a good factor

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that's something that's intrinsic to you.
Then that's the opposite of emptiness.

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But what emptiness refers to is that 
it's all about that person's perception

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as being good, or that person's 
perception as being bad.

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But there's nothing intrinsic 
within you that's good or bad.

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So in other words, you don't have an 
essential kind of form or an element

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or an attribute within you 
that somebody can point to

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and say that's good or that's bad.

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It is just their perception of you 
in that space and time context

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in which they claim 
that you are good or bad.

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So in that case when somebody says you are
a bad person or you're a good person.

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Then I can say that 
she is neither good nor bad.

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She is just, she is empty.

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So that in that case empty 
doesn't means that you don't exist,

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that there's nothing,
or there's just a void.

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It just means that there's 
no attribute within you,

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or an essence within you intrinsically 
that we can call as good or bad.

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Say we have this thing.

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Somebody actually ate a little bit 
of this thing and got healed.

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And so that person said 
'Okay this is a great medicine’.

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But somebody else actually ate the 
same thing and then actually got sick.

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And that person pointed the same 
thing and said that's poison.

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So is this thing medicine or poison?

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There are three things.

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One is 'This is medicine',

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and one 'This is poison'.

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The third is that it has medicinal 
properties or it has poisonous properties.

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But this thing itself is empty.

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That means that it neither has 
toxic properties nor medicinal properties.

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That means that this is just the thing.

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But in whatever context and situation, 
this thing has been applied to

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sometimes has medicinal attributes 
or sometimes it has toxic attributes.

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So that's when you use the word 
empty or Gong (공) to refer to that

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this is neither medicinal nor toxic, 
you are neither good nor bad person.

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So all existence whether that's biological
a thing or non biological organic

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or even a thought, 
a mental phenomena

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and it's just empty 
it's neither good nor bad.

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And it is just what it is.

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So that's why we call it 
or label it as empty

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because that's the truth it is what it is.

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However that thing how it's represented or
manifest really depends on the situation

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the context and the connections 
in which it is allowed to manifest.

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So in some situations, you are a person 
in some situations, you're a bad person.

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In some situations this thing is a 
medicine in other it is a poison.

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So when we say Gong (공) the empty,

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that is kind of what a thing is 
what a phenomenon is.

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But however it's represented 
within the context or situation

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it finds itself in and that 
is what we call Form.

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Therefore if you really truly understand 
that all essence of all existence

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is really empty then there's 
no cause for you to suffer.

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Because you realize the person 
is neither bad nor good.

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That doesn't mean 
that person does not exist.

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That just means that the person in this 
situation in this space and time context

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under this specific set of conditions 
may appear to be good or bad to me.

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Doesn't look like 
you are fully clear on that.

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I am thinking of how you mention 
good or bad sometimes is empty.

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At the same time I can't help 
to think of historical dictators

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that have caused a lot of hurt.

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But also at the same time 
I have in my head explained to myself

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that they have violated 
the precepts. That's all.

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So even the precepts themselves are empty.

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I guess I am still a little confused 
about the precepts being empty.

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Do you mean they are dependent

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on the historical age we're in 
the society that we're in?

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There's no ethical precepts that we can 
absolutely say that this is the truth.

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That this is the way regardless 
of the situation and time and space

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that we find ourselves in, because 
that actually is a very dangerous path.

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So what Buddha taught us 
that the proper way the right way

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is always determined by the space and 
time of the situation that we are under.

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It's basically setting a compass down 
in a new place and seeing

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where it points north and
that's when you find the right way.

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So everything is dependent

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even though the proper path on that, 
that's the middle way.

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And the concept of that middle way as it
transition over to Mahayana Buddhism,

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it became translated 
or understood as emptiness.

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So the emptiness, the concept 
and the words, actually was a criticism

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against Theravada kind 
of rigid traditionalism

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in which they claimed that a certain 
set of ethical constructions was the way.

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And the criticism in Mahayana against that
was that the construct should be empty.

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So basically the original criticism 
which Theravada's rigid absoluteness

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of the way was that there is no fixed way 
and that eventually got translated

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and kind of consolidated 
into the word emptiness.

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Basically when someone 
claims that this the truth,

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then the criticism is that there's 
nothing that you can point to and say

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that's the absolute truth, and that got
translated into that sense of emptiness.

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So the fact that we misunderstand 
emptiness or the concept

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because of the word that we use 
in space, but it's only a part of all.

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We usually obsess over somebody else, 
if we like that person.

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And we want to make that person behave 
the way we want them to behave.

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So if they don't behave 
accordingly then we feel bitter.

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And if that disappointment becomes 
too much then we just let go,

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and we become indifferent to them.

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If we realize this concept of emptiness

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then we can actually 
let go of our obsession.

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Then we can allow him or her 
to behave as they want.

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If they ask for our help, 
then we help.

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If they don't ask for help, 
then we don't help.

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So we're neither indifferent 
in this case nor obsessive.