This book investingates the teachings of emptiness in early Buddhism, as recorded in the Pali and Chinese version of the early Buddhist canon. In general, the findig is that these two version,although differently worded, record in common that the teaching of the historical Buddha as connected with emptiness. The general reader, with little or no prior knowledge of Buddhism, can discover in this book how early Buddhism provides a vision and a method to help in overcoming the ills of the mind.

Research Paper (undergraduate) from the year 2017 in the subject Psychology - Psychology of Religion, grade: A, Kathmandu University (Rangjung Yeshe Institute), course: Yogachara Philosophy, language: English, abstract: The purpose of this term paper is to prove that, in the context of dependent origination, we have no control over our actions. I will attempt to name as many causes as I can and I will support my thesis in the context of Buddhist philosophy, using Buddhist texts, primary and secondary sources, reviewing the function and effects of the alaya-vijnana, the klistamanas and latent tendencies, to determine the causality of person and volition, and the lack of personal autonomy. Although it may seem that by ruling out karma all together I am undermining Buddhism as fundamentally mistaken, but I am not. I will address briefly, the soteriological application to Buddhism without karma towards the end of the essay where I consider the matter in a much broader presentation of the religion as a whole, and the Buddha's instructions to take control of our actions. There is an apparent casual order to the universe, some apparent pattern or design - not to imply a conscious designer, but rather a reality of cause and effect. As we try to measure the contours of our reality, a reality that becomes limited in one thought and infinite in another, we often find ourselves caught between limited and infinite, trying to figure out how much of it is caused by something else and how much of it is caused by us. Pratityasamutpada, the doctrine of dependent origination, and sunyata, the doctrine of emptiness, are the two most fundamental teachings in Mahayana Buddhism. Together they teach that everything and every moment is a temporary construction that is inherently empty of any independent existence. The doctrine of dependent-origination seems to imply that reality is a culmination of factors imposing a limited moment-to-moment, framed existence. And it's here, in this impo

The Summary of the Great Vehicle is perhaps the most representative text of the Yogacara school of Mahayana Buddhism. It presents the classic argument for the basic Yogacara themes on conscious interiority, attempting to reinterpret within this context the general Mahayana teachings of emptiness and dependent co-arising. It then proceeds to explain the etiology if imaginative illusion, sketch its reversal by offering an explanation of the nature of conversion, champion the recovered insight into depended co-arising in terms of the converted other-dependent pattern of consciousness, and thus allow for a valid, if limited, role for language-formed, conventional discourse, both commonsense and theoretical.

Nagao invariably focuses on the core of Mahāyāna Buddhism--the path of the Bodhisattva, the doctrine of śūnyatā, and the system of Trisvabhāva are explained. Important technical terms used in the Mahayana textual tradition, whose exact understanding is imperative for the study of Mahāyāna Buddhism, are skillfully presented, making the book indispensable to scholars of Buddhist studies.

This book comprises fifteen research articles primarily based on the discipline of Indian and Buddhist Studies. The collection is designed to propose a Buddhist philosophy of religion--that the insight of Prajna and Sunyata initiates a future religion which is freed both from conflict between reasoning and believing, and from goal-oriented cycles of life. It addresses transformation from the conflict-ridden quest for a supreme being, to the search for a non-theistic nature of spirituality that provides a foundation for universal human happiness and salvation. For the discipline of Buddhist Studies, this collection also demonstrates the productive value of drawing upon cross-cultural and cross-racial literary sources and traditions.

Deals With 2 Important Concepts-Bodhisattva And Sunyata In Mahayana Texts Which In Fact Had Their Routes In Pali Nikayas. The Study Helps In Understanding The Doctrines Of Mahayana And Those Found In Pali Nikaya. Contains 9 Chapters.

Tathagatagarbha -- Buddha Nature -- is a central concept of Mahayana Buddhism crucial to all the living practice traditions of Tibetan and Zen Buddhism. Its relationship to the concept of emptiness has been a subject of controversy for seven hundred years. Dr. Hookam's work investigates the divergent interpretations of these concepts and the way the Tibetan tradition is resolving them. In particular she does this with reference to the only surviving Indian commentary on the Tathagatagarbha doctrine, the Ratnagotravibhaga. This text addresses itself directly to the issue of how to relate the doctrine of emptiness (the illusory nature of the world) to that of the truly existing, changeless Absolute (the Buddha Nature). This is the first work by a Western writer to present an analysis of the Shentong tradition based on previously untranslated sources. The Shentong view rests on meditative experience that is inaccessible to the conceptualizing mind. It is deeply rooted in the sutra tradition of Indian Buddhism and is central to an understanding of the Mahamudra and Dzogchen traditions and Tantric practice among Kagyupas and Hyingmapas.