Not for Nothing

Here we go again. ‘Emptiness’ is not “nothing.” It is not non-being, non-existence, or non-presence. In the Western Buddhism that I studied, Americans often defined shunyata as “nothing”, as total Void, as lack, as absence of anything. I no longer define shunyata that way. In fact, the literal definition of the Sanskrit shunyata is the “number zero” or 0. But “Zero” is not “nothing.” Zero is a number that exists within a mathematical system. “Zero” does not lack a value–Zero IS a value–the value “0”. Moreover, “0” has a function, a mathematical function within the number system. (Any number) X 0 = 0; 0 X 5 = 0; 0 X 6 = 0. Zero has a specific mathematical function that no other number has. Likewise, (Any number) X 1 = that number. 1 X 5 = 5; 1 X 6= 6. The number “one” has a specific mathematical function that no other number has. The other unique mathematical function of Zero is as “placeholder”. In our number system, “0” holds a place, an empty space, in which a value could appear. So “Zero” is not nothing; it is empty, but it has existence, it has properties that distinguish it from other numbers, and it has specific functions that no other number has. That means it is something, and not “nothing.”

Emptiness is something other than nothing. Quite the opposite: Emptiness is capacity, it is openness, or ‘zeroness’. It is the infinite capacity or space for something to appear. It is the potential for being, the necessary condition for anything to exist. It is the infinite space in which Being is possible. It is pure potentiality. As such it is pure presence. Although it cannot be sensed or experienced, materially, with the five senses; it can be felt, intuitively. It is Being-Itself. It is the quality of Being, minus any material manifestation. Yet Being is experienced through material manifestation. Thus anything that has material substance has being. Emptiness-being is inseparable from Form-being. Thus, ‘form is emptiness; emptiness is form’.