Prajnaparamita Emptiness Focus
Prajñāpāramitā (प्रज्ञापारमिता),
The Perfection of Wisdom
EMPTINESS
About a half dozen models formed around varying interpretations of the Perfection of Wisdom.
One Prajñā school, called the Original Nothingness school (Benwu, 本無), adopted a neo-Daoist cosmology saying that everything has emerged from a primordial, original emptiness, and everything returns to that void.
The problem was not that "energy can be changed but never destroyed" and that the base is non-matter, but in considering that state to be emptiness.
Another school, called the Mind Empty school (Xinwu, 心無), equated the primordial Nothing with the nature of mind.
Each of the Prajñā schools managed to either promote a metaphysical substantialized emptiness which they opposed to form.
A. Five ways to consider Dharmas
1.
Dharmas are non-existent.
"What has no own-being, that is non-existent. (Therefore the (absolute) own-being is a negation of the (pluralistic) own-being, and it is in this sense that one must understand our thesis that the own-being of entities is unreal."
2.
Words are dharmas, a matter of conventional expression (vyavahaara), and upon them the human creature seeks a false support. Words are names and signs; they are imagined, artificial adventitious designations which are added on to what is appears to be there.
A sincere follower of Dharma does not expect to find any realities behind those words, and, in consequence, he does not settle down in them or depend upon them.
The dharmas themselves behind these words are inexpressible and their Emptiness clearly cannot be properly expressed in words.
3.
It is said that Dharmas can be "without marks, with one mark only, or with no mark." So what are these marks?
A "mark" is here then defined as the distinctive property which keeps dharmas apart. For example the dharma of flame has the mark of heat. But be careful here, for "heat" is not a true function, although "giving heat" would be and has a subtle difference.
The most essential mark of a dharmas is beyond this for all dharmas have an essential mark which is emptiness. Since at that level all dharmas have the same emptiness then there is no difference in different dharmas.
Lets get this clear.
Saariputra asks, "What, then, is the own-being of form... ?"
Subhuuti answers: "Non-existence is the own-being of form...
It is in this sense that form is lacking in the own-being of form.
... Moreover, form is lacking in the mark which is characteristic of form.
... The mark, again, is lacking in the own-being of a mark.
... The own-being, again, is lacking in the mark of being own-being.
What is being said here can be understood as the ultimate conceptualization of "own-being" is empty.
Thus, "with no attributes," that which is without charactaristics, therefore cannot be "pointed out" as something definite nor existing.
4.
A dharma is called "empty" when one considers that it has no properties, "isolated" when one considers that it has no relations to other dharmas.
As isolated, dharmas cannot act on each other, therefore, they are not made or produced.
5.
Dharmas cannot be produced, never come into existence; they have never left the original total state of emptiness of all dharmas.
Even to contemplate the rise and fall of dharmas had been recommended as one of the central practices of the Abhidharma is not useful here as an advanced practice, for although the meditations may be healthy they are illusion bringing illusory consequences.
B. Psychological attitudes
1.
Non-apprehension. If separate dharmas are non-existent, cognitive activities directed toward them will be without a basis in fact.
It would be a mistake, therefore, to regard such cognitive activities as a means of approaching reality.
The apprehension of a multiplicity of separate entities should be avoided.
Even emptiness should not be apprehended.
Going beyond Emptiness requires the contemplation of the last conceptualization of Emptiness, namely, the Emptiness of Emptiness.
2.
a) There should be no conviction that dharmas have reality.
b) There should be no inclination toward dharmas.
c) There should be no attachment to dharmas.
3.
No person can "attain, have, possess, acquire, or gain" any dharma.
There is no dharma to get and no person to get it.
4.
The mind of the Tathaagata is not supported on anything, and those who wish to emulate him should "raise a single thought which is not supported anywhere."
The contemplation of this type was that used by Bodhidharma in his Wall Gazing. Namely, the last conceptualization of the Nature of Buddha.
It is in the practice of the perfections of "vacuity, unity, impermanence, clear comprehension and the Life Force itself, that one learns to lean on nothing whatever.
When one practices the fifth, all four of the elements should be accomplished in a spirit of complete disinterestedness and inner freedom. That is without Identity.
5.
Finally, one may say that the attitude of the perfected person of Dao is one of non-assertion.
His individual self is extinct, and so he will not assert himself in any way, he will not except in teaching affirm anything about any of them.
DUALITY
The assumption of any kind of duality is considered as the basic error of logical thinking. "Those who course in duality cannot grow in merit. All the foolish common people are supported (ni'srita) by duality, and their merit cannot grow. But a person sincere upon the Dharma path dwells in non-duality."
The Prajnaparamita claims that errors of discrimination (going towards with liking, avoiding with dislike and Identity indifference) is the core of ignorance and that the empirical world, with its attendant sufferings, is a thought-construction derived from these false discrimination.
If all dharmas are empty and non-different, they are, by that very fact, all the same.
When you abstract the differences between dharmas and proceed to their "suchness," taking each dharma illusion as it is, without adding to what is actually there or subtracting from it, then there is no error..
(1) The duality of subject and object exists where there are the five senses and their objects, mind and mind-object (dharma), even with awakening and non-awakening. With absolute knowledge, all forms of Duality are abolished.
(2) Affirmation and negation, existence and non-existence, are not to be held apart as separate. It is the same "to be" as "not to be."
If existence and non-existence are equalized, and even ideas of "yes" and "no" are identified correctly, then the disorder of the mind is said to disappear.
What is "essential nature" is "no essential nature," what is "practice" is "no practice."
In a celebrated passage, the "absolute thought," which is "without modification or discrimination," and to which one should aspire, is identified with "no-thought."
But that thought which is no-thought is not something which is, because one cannot find in it either in 'there is' or a 'there is not.'
Now that all sounds like double talk, going around in circles, but it is not at all. The secret of understanding lies in the clear and certain knowledge that the system, the true nature, is itself wise and can rise correctly to every situation without the mental help of dual thought.
This means allowing oneself to let go and respond to the inner noble voice of the Life Force and use the dharmas only as tools to assist the natural force in correct execution of all behaviours.
Some of the considerable prestige of the Diamond Sutra derives from the fact that it makes throughout a point of observing that each one of the leading concepts of Buddhist theory is equivalent to its contradictory opposite and can only be understood by letting go of both so that understanding in and of itself is not required.
Thus one can teach contemplation or Dharma without doing so, while others will perceive that contemplation and Dharma are being taught.
The Absolute trust in what is natural plays havoc with the rules of logic and lateral thinking.
When this is attained it must lead to calm, patience, determination, perseverance and an introspection that is all empty.
Far from trying to get out of conditioned existence, the follower of the Emptiness of Prajnapaaramita, armed with untrembling courage and unlimited compassion, does not avoid calamities of further existence. The warrior does not isolate himself from the world, but becomes its savior.