Mipham Rinpoche. Beacon of Certainty (the 7 questions about emptiness). Short summary & re-interpretation by Andrei Volkov.
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1. Q: How to explain emptiness: literally or figuratively?
A: Literally. Although the emptiness can be explained as the virtual existence, explaining that the snake virtually exists is confusing, since it still leaves the mind clinging to the entity called “snake”. There’s no snake [there's only the rope confused for the snake].
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2. Q: What are the two kinds of emptiness?
A: The two kinds of emptiness are emptiness of self and emptiness of phenomena.
To realize emptiness of I — aka personal emptiness — is to abandon instinctive apprehension of the aggregates as “I”. This liberates from emotional obscurations.
The other one is phenomenal emptiness — to realize it liberates from cognitive obscurations.
While working on the two kinds of emptiness it is important to understand that one also needs complete collection of internal and external causes and conditions.
Besides the emptiness, complete cultivation includes: accumulation of good causes, practice of various modes of reasoning, bodhicitta, the conduct based on the bodhicitta, dedication of merit to other beings, training in suchness etc.
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3. Q: Should meditation on emptiness be understood as meditation free of any apprehension (thoughts)?
A: This topic is often misunderstood. Buddha mind is free from apprehension as a result of the great understanding being so complete that it does not require apprehension, but lack of apprehension is not the cause for achieving Buddha mind. Sitting without thoughts is merely the state of a rock.
Other similar misunderstandings:
Some understand emptiness as “there’s nothing to attain, so there’s no need to work on awakening”.
Some say that they already understand personal emptiness — merely based on their inability to see/catch the mind or the I.
When realization of emptiness is explained as “not apprehending self/phenomena as either existing nor as non existing” it is not to be simply understood as apprehending self/phenomena as having dual appearance e.g. “while it looks like “I” exists but since it can’t be nailed down therefore at the same time it does not exist”; Furthermore — this “neither-not” should not be taken as just another concept for the mind. What is really meant is freedom from the apprehension of forms, deep understanding of relativity of appearances, beyond thought and simplistic expressions like exist/non-exist.
Alright, now that we’re done with mistakes let’s get to the correct meditation.
The antidote for apprehension of forms is modal apprehension of selfness (emptiness). First of all you need to understand what selfness means. Just imagining it is not enough. If you mistake rope for a snake, it does not help to think “there’s no snake”, but if you see how it does not exist, it disappears. Having understood selfness through analysis, meditate again and again on it, to uproot the habit of the apprehension of forms to the point of certainty.
But achieving certainty based on the apprehension of nonexistance of self and phenomena is not the ultimate result. Modal apprehension of nonexistence eventually induces the real emptiness – certainty of truthlessness, great relatively w/o apprehension of either form, or emptiness. This emptiness is really worthy of your confidence. But whoever says this can be achieved in an instance and does not require long effort and gradual progress is an idiot.
In short, meditation on emptiness means: Study and reflect, analyze and observe, work in stages, grow accustomed to emptiness. Final meditation on emptiness means state of certainty of this emptiness (in the sense explained above), with nothing else apprehended.
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4. Q: So, in light of the above, is meditation an analytical activity or a trance?
A: Some say analysis obscures true nature of things, but others criticize trance, saying it is just like sleeping.
Actually, meditation needs both.
No analysis — no certainty. No certainty — no freedom from obscurations. Need to investigate the nature of things with hundred methods of reasoning. Cutting through emotional and cognitive obscurations, back to primordial purity, requires perfecting the view.
As for the trance aspect, this is the great bliss, clarity, awareness [of the right brain?] made visible through the removal of emotional and cognitive obscurations due to the non-apprehension of self, phenomena, emptiness, existence, non-existence, or any other form, it [non-apprehension] being caused in its turn by the certainty induced by the analysis.
Until certainty is born, one should induce it with exercises and analysis. When certainty is born, one should meditate in that state without analysis. While certainty exists, false conceptuality does not. If certainty is lost, then induce it again through analysis.
Alternate between analysis and certainty. Certainty of emptiness and the mind projecting the forms are mutually exclusive. Finally, when certainty arises by itself, w/o analysis, there’s no need to go through analysis again. When you see that rope is not a snake, there’s no sense in doing the analysis of the absence of the snake.
As you see, both apprehension and non-apprehension play their parts.
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5: Q: which of the two realities (truths) is more important: ultimate (“emptiness”) or deceptive (normal appearance)?
A: Some say emptiness is pure, while appearance is impure. Based on this they say that appearance should be abandoned. Others pretend that appearance is pure, without having understood the inseparability of appearance from emptiness. This is like perfuming a vase full of vomit.
The truth is: there are no two realities. Substance and non-substance are merely relative aspects describing same underlying essence. It is only for beginners they appear as negation and negandum.
In reality there’s no evil / no good in samsara or nirvana. Nirvana is not attained by abandoning samsara.
Even when the equality of the two realities is understood there’s a room for mistakes. Two typical mistakes are:
1) having understood correct view but not taking advantage of it, still seeing yourself as inferior or superior to somebody, or
2) having understood correct view but being still attached to old habits, to “practice equality” by eating meat, drinking alcohol, accumulating wealth etc.
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6: Q: What is the nature of an object commonly perceived by different observers?
A: Traditional materialistic philosophy, as well as people’s instinctive worldview presumes existence of external objects. Various idealistic philosophies presume the primacy of mind. Both fall into extremes.
The key is to understand that different people (and same people at different time) have different perceptions. Common “object” is merely an abstraction of these different perceptions. The perception of each observer (and of the same observer at different times) includes unique elements: observer’s perspective, context, preconceptions, obscurations, differences in the capabilities of sensory organs, as well as circumstances when the observation is made etc. The phenomena perceived by the observer cannot be considered in isolation of these other elements, since they may (and often do) radically change the perceived “object”. This is the sense in which the statement “subject is not separate from object” is made. From evolutionary perspective, the invention of “object” by the evolving mind is an obvious step since it allows the mind to easily attribute repeating patterns of its perceptions to the common identity of the object. However, the mind tends to assume that these entities are concrete and stable, while in reality they are merely temporary combinations of various factors. This obsession with quasi-stable entities creates all kinds of problems, the most infamous of which is the ego-centrism. As to the question whether there’s such thing as “valid” cognition it should be said that although all cognitions are constructed on the bases of perceptions of temporarily combined elements (so in this sense no one cognition is better than any other), however, since there’s a case of observer being aware or unaware of the compound nature of objects of perception, there’s a sense in which such cognitions can be called “valid” or “invalid” correspondingly.
This topic (inseparability of the basis of appearances from appearances themselves) is just one of many ways to approach the same fundamental truth. Other ways to reason about the nature of reality include:
- the absence of partiality and extremes
- the coalescence of form and emptiness
- objects (and self) nether existing nor non-existing
- nature of causation and freedom of will
- dependent co-arising
- prajna-paramita
etc.
but their all have the same taste and revolve around the same basic idea.
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7: Q: Does Madhyamika have a philosophical position or not?
A: Saying either that it has or that it doesn’t have a position would itself be a position. The fruition of the teaching is establishing of inseparability (coalescence) of the two realities (known as “appearance” and “emptiness”). The Great Gnosis of Equipoise, transcends the conceptual mind, therefore it transcends any position, including the notions of appearance, emptiness and even coalescence. However, this Gnosis should not be understood as something only existing theoretically and being impossible to be experienced. Instead, when the practitioner attains certainty free of doubt, this Gnosis appears to such practitioner as the ultimate meaning, beyond all positions, the state of awareness without an object, without any “this” or “that”.
