the
Buddha's Second
Response
Let's
re-approach this "bewilderment" concerning this critical
teaching of sunyatā (which
should perhaps always remain a bewilderment!) with something that
goes like this (modified from Stephen Prothero's God is Not
One 2010:193-196):
Reiterate the landscape:
- Since everything comes and goes in a
great chain of cause and effect, nothing is independent; nothing
exists on its own, i.e., paticcasamuppada - "dependent origination."
There is no "fire" unless there is
"fuel" and no "fuel" without
"plants", and no "plants" without
"soil" and "water" and "nutriments,"
etc.
- Yes, things appear to have
permanent, unchanging essences, but as much as we hate
to admit it, nothing is really permanent, and everything
is constantly changing, i.e., anicca -
"transitory," like "water."
- Thus, things appear to be
unto themselves - this cup, this plate, this "fork."
But everything is made of something else and is always
in the process of becoming something other than what it
now appears to be. A fork is just a loose aggregate
of forms - skandhas. And
further, even
this fork in my hand is only a "fork" among
English speakers, i.e., "thought-coverings."
In a culture of chopsticks unacquainted with Western
place settings, it is simply an oddly shaped curio.
as we recall, tanha -
desire, attachment, is the sources of suffering.
So want to move beyond "thought-coverings," as aggregate
forms are illusionary.
as they perpetuate convention and
the notions of self, and soul, and . . . .
attachments
- Thus "sunyatā"
has
something to do with impermanence, with dependent
origination, with you and I placing
"thought-coverings" around it, or
at least its opposite, distinct, in contrast with the
aggregate forms?
-
empty? formless?
extinguished?
So what does that leave us with
?
return
to schedule