PACIFIC WORLD - The Institute of Buddhist Studies

Hopkins: Paradigm Change in Meditation 127Just as a magician’s illusory elephant appears to be an elephant but in factis not, so forms, sounds, and so forth appear to exist inherently but areunderstood as not existing inherently. The meaning of being like anillusion is not that the “I” or forms, sounds, and so forth appear to exist butactually do not; rather, their mode of existence appears to be concrete butis understood not to be so. The same is true for the I. Mere realization thata magician’s illusions or dream objects are not real does not constituterealizing phenomena to be like a magician’s illusions, nor does realizationof phenomena as like illusions mean that one merely desists from identifyingappearances. The essential point is that the meditator first mustrealize that these objects do not inherently exist; there is no othermethod for inducing realization that phenomena are like illusions.Realization of the emptiness of inherent existence is said, in this system,to be the only method for gaining the subsequent realization thatphenomena are like illusions.The Fourth Pa˚-chen Lama speaks similarly but also addresses theissue of the substance of those appearances that are left over. He calls forviewing them as the sport 13 of emptiness. 14 Since the emptiness of inherentexistence makes appearance possible, phenomena are, in a sense, the sportof emptiness. It even may be said that their basic substance is emptiness.However, emptiness is a non-affirming negative, a mere absence or mereelimination of inherent existence, which does not imply anything in placeof inherent existence even though it is compatible with dependently arisenphenomena. Hence, emptiness is not a positive substance giving rise tophenomena, even if it is their ground. Emptiness is what makes cause andeffect possible; the emptiness of the mind is called the Buddha nature, thecausal lineage of Buddhahood, even though it is not itself an actual cause.As a mere negative of inherent existence, it makes enlightenment possible.Summation of the Sutra Model of Meditation onSelflessness and AppearanceIncluding the steps of setting the basic motivation for meditation onthe selflessness of the person as well as the subsequent state of realizingappearances to be like illusions, we can distinguish seven steps in the Sutraprocess of meditating on the selflessness of the person:1. adjustment of motivation: taking refuge and developing analtruistic intention to become enlightened2. ascertaining what is being negated—inherent existence3. ascertaining entailment of emptiness4. ascertaining that the “I” and the aggregates are not inherentlythe same