David Eckel: 12 Emptiness

At the heart of Mahayana practice lies the paradoxical and elusive concept of Emptiness. When they speak about the nature of reality, Mahayana texts claim that nothing exists in its own right. They say, in other words, that everything is “empty” of identity. Like many Buddhist concepts, Emptiness seems at first to be very negative, but the Mahayana tradition claims that it is exactly the opposite.

Mahayana texts insist that “everything is possible for someone for whom Emptiness is possible.” To understand how this can be true, we need to consider the doctrine of two truths. While it may be true that nothing exists in its own right from the ultimate point of view, it is possible to take the ordinary categories of life seriously in a provisional or conventional way. Learning to distinguish between the ultimate and conventional perspectives is one of the most important and liberating skills in the practice of the Mahayana.

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