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When someone seeks to understand Buddhism, where should that person
start? With the meaning of taking refuge in the three jewels? With
the four noble truths? The Dalai Lama, when asked this question,
suggested that for many in the West today, understanding the two
truths--conventional truth and ultimate truth--is the best place to
start.
When the Buddha awoke from the dream we still dream, he saw the
ultimate reality of things just as they are. There are shifting
appearances and conventions, the manners and traditions of the vast
and diverse world; and then there is the mystery of the sheer
reality of things. And yet we cannot find this reality anywhere
else but right here.
Each system of Buddhist philosophy has its own way of explaining
exactly what these two truths are and how they relate to one
another. In exploring these systems, we are looking over the
shoulders of Buddhist thinkers as they grapple with a basic
question: 'What is real?' This is not an idle intellectual exercise
but a matter which cuts to the heart of our practice in life.
Readers are hard-pressed to find books that can help them
understand the central concept in Mahayana Buddhism the idea that
ultimate reality is "emptiness." In clear language, Introduction to
Emptiness explains that emptiness is not a mystical sort of
"nothingness," but a specific truth that can and must be understood
through calm and careful reflection. Newland's contemporary
examples and vivid anecdotes will help readers understand this core
concept as presented in one of the great classic texts of the
Tibetan Tradition, Tsong-kha-pa's Great Treatise on the Stages of
the Path to Enlightenment. This new edition includes quintessential
points for each chapter.
A Namgyal Monastery Institute Textbook & Studies in
Indo-Tibetan Buddhism Series
The persistent problem of Buddhist philosophy has been to find the
middle way--an ontology sturdy enough to support a coherent ethical
system that does not betray Buddha's original vision of no-self or
emptiness (sunyata). Buddhist perspectives on ethics and emptiness
center on the distinction between two truths--the conventional and
the ultimate. Newland's work lays out the Madhyamika philosophy of
two truths as seen through the eyes of Tibetan scholar-yogis of the
Gelugpa order. Linking the classical Buddhist philosophy of
Nagarjuna with the living tradition of monastic courtyard debate,
the authors explain the two truths without resort to mysterious
trans-rational paradoxes. Newland exposes their extraordinary
efforts to clear away the sense of contradiction between emptiness
and conventional reality and thus to build a Madhyamika system that
is both ethically salutary and rationally coherent.
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