The zhentong (gzhan stong; also phonetisized shentong) philosophy of emptiness is a positivist tradition in the history of Indian and Tibetan Buddhist thought that includes a range of philosophical views and meditative experiences that express the ultimate to be emptiness (śūnyatā; stong pa nyid) devoid of everything other than (gzhan) buddhanature (tathāgatagarbha; de bzhin gshegs pa’i snying po), a luminous essence that pervades living beings. The literal meaning of zhentong is to be empty of other, which is commonly translated as “other-emptiness” or “extrinsic emptiness.” In contrast to zhentong, philosophical views that assert emptiness devoid of an intrinsic nature (svabhāva) are rangtong (rang stong), which means to be empty of itself, and is commonly translated as “self-emptiness” or “intrinsic emptiness.” Adherents to zhentong views are called “Zhentongpas,” while adherents to rangtong views are called “Rangtongpas.” Accordingly, Tibetan adherents to zhentong generally divide the Madhyamaka school of Buddhist thought into two sub-schools: (a) General Madhyamaka or Rangtong Madhyamaka, namely the Prāsaṅgika and Svātantrika approaches; and (b) Great Madhyamaka or Zhentong Madhyamaka. Historically, there are zhentong proponents from the Jonang, Nyingma, Kagyü, Sakya, and Kadam orders of Tibetan Buddhism.
Canonical Indian Buddhist sources for zhentong include the ten Essence Sūtras, ten Sūtras on Definitive Meaning, Five Treatises of Maitreya, and Nāgārjuna’s Collection of Hymns. Influential sūtras that discuss buddhanature in these collections include the Śrīmālādevī-siṃhanāda Sūtra, Tathāgatagarbha Sūtra, and Laṇkāvatāra Sūtra. Among the Five Treatises of Maitreya, the Ratnagotravibhāga, or what is popularly known as the Uttaratantra, is most frequently cited. Nāgārjuna’s Collection of Hymns provides a positivist appraisal of the ultimate, juxtaposed to his more well-known Collection on Reasoning. The most important tantras for zhentong are the Bodhisattva Trilogy, which are the definitive Indian commentaries on the Kālacakra Tantra, Hevajra Tantra, and the Cakrasamvara Tantra. Among these, the Vimalaprabhā commentary on the Kālacakra is paramount.
The most prominent proponent of zhentong in Tibet was the Jonang scholar Dölpopa Sherab Gyaltsen (1292–1361) who formalized the usage of the terms rangtong and zhentong to distinguish two modes of emptiness: emptiness devoid of an intrinsic nature, and what is not empty of buddhanature. During the 15th century, the most influential zhentong thinker was the Sakya scholar Shākya Chokden (1428–1507), whose zhentong view differed from Dölpopa’s, particularly on his interpretation of the constancy of nondual awareness. Several hierarchs in the Kagyü order of Tibetan Buddhism articulated zhentong views, including the Third Karmapa Rangjung Dorjé (1284–1339), Second Zharmapa Kachö Wangpo (1350–1405), Seventh Karmapa Chödrak Gyatso (1454–1506), and the Eighth Karmapa Mikyo Dorjé (1507–1554). The most prolific Jonang author in the history of zhentong after Dölpopa was Tāranātha (1575–1635) who was inspired by a vision to preserve Dölpopa’s insights. Following his death, however, the government of central Tibet headed by the Fifth Dalai Lama Ngawang Lobzang Gyatso (1617–1682) confiscated Tāranātha’s monastery, converted Jonang studies to a Geluk curricula, and banned books on zhentong. The Jonang fled to eastern Tibet where they revitalized their tradition of zhentong and the Kālacakra in regions of Amdo. The Nyingma polymath Rikzin Tsewang Norbu (1698–1755) from Katok Monastery in Kham inspired zhentong thinking in several important figures including his compeer Situ Paṇchen Chökyi Jungné (1699–1774), and the later Nyingma scholar Katok Getsé Paṇḍita Tsewang Chökdrup (1761–1829) who wrote on Zhentong Madhyamaka in the context of explaining Dzokchen. As part of their Rimé project, Jamgön Kongtrul Lodrö Tayé (1813–1899) and Jamyang Khyentsé Wangpo (1820–1892) centrally positioned zhentong within their brand of Buddhist ecumenicalism. Among Jonang scholars in the modern era, Khenpo Lodrö Drakpa (1920–1975) from Dzamtang was the most important author on zhentong whose work sought to realign zhentong philosophical thinking with Dölpopa and Tāranātha.
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Introduction to Zhentong (Extrinsic Emptiness)
Michael R. Sheehy
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Nāgārjuna
Mark Siderits
Nāgārjuna was the 2nd-century ce founder of the Madhyamaka school of Indian Buddhist philosophy. He is best known for his articulation and defense of the core Mahāyāna claim that all things are empty (śūnya) or devoid of intrinsic nature. When this claim is understood against the background of the metaphysical theories of the Abhidharma schools of Buddhism, it amounts to the denial that anything is ultimately, or strictly speaking, real. This appears tantamount to the (seemingly absurd) claim that nothing whatsoever really exists, and this interpretation has been common among Nāgārjuna’s opponents, both classical and modern. Defenders of Nāgārjuna and the Madhyamaka school have developed a variety of ways of understanding emptiness that seek to do justice to Nāgārjuna’s denial that he is a nihilist. An additional constraint on interpreting Nāgārjuna’s arguments has been arriving at a reading that also accommodates the soteriological significance claimed for the doctrine: How might the realization that nothing has its nature intrinsically prove crucial to attaining the Buddhist goal of the cessation of suffering? Given the many challenges inherent in developing a suitable hermeneutical strategy, Nāgārjuna’s work has garnered much attention both in the world of Asian Buddhism and among modern scholars.
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Emotion in American Religions
John Corrigan
Emotion is an important part of religions in America. There is great diversity among emotional styles. Some groups are highly emotional, others relatively low in emotional expression, and some occupy a middle ground. Religious life is characterized by cultivation and expression of many emotions. Four that are of particular importance for Americans are wonder, empathy, anticipation, and the feeling of emptiness. Some emotions are treated as commodities. The study of emotion in religion enables fresh perspectives on the interwovenness of emotion, religion, and culture. The investigation of the emotional lives of religious persons in America can be advanced through study of persons’ reporting of their experiences alongside research bearing on cultural expectations for emotional life.
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Buddhism in Film
Sharon A. Suh
Film serves as one of the most recent contributions to the variety of Buddhist visual forms that can offer a perspectival shift in interpretation for its viewers akin to other meditative devices such as mandalas. As a relatively recent subject of study, Buddhist films present innovative opportunities to visualize the Buddha, Buddhism, and the self in nuanced ways. Buddhist film can be understood as a spiritual technology that reshapes vision, and the act of viewing becomes a ritual process and contemplative practice. Ranging from films with an explicitly Buddhist theme and content to more abstract films without obvious Buddhist references, Buddhist films have become the subject of scholarly studies of Buddhism as well as occasions to reimagine Buddhism on and off screen. Buddhist films found in Asia and the West have proliferated globally through the rise of international Buddhist film festivals over the past fifteen years that have increased both the interest in Buddhism and the field of Buddhism and film itself. Most studies of Buddhism in film indicate that what constitutes a Buddhist film continually evolves and, as such, can be seen as a contemporary instantiation of the skillful means of the Buddha.
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Feeling of Emptiness and Religion in America
John Corrigan
As part of a broader turn in humanities scholarship toward emotion since the late 20th century, scholars of religion increasingly have explored how emotion has been a key component in the lives of religious Americans. The relation of emotion to religious ideas has been particularly important in this nascent scholarship. In exploring how emotions and religious ideas are intertwined, scholars have focused on emotions such as love, melancholy, fear, and anger, among others. However, for reasons having to do with the historiography of American religion, as well as with categories that have governed much academic study of religion in America, the feeling of emptiness, which is so crucial to understanding Buddhism, and other Asian religions, has been underestimated for its role in American religions. In America, the feeling of emptiness plays a central role in religious practice, community formation, and identity construction, among Christians (the religious majority) but also in other religious communities. This essay describes some of the ways in which the feeling of emptiness has been expressed in American religions, and in American culture more generally, comments on how it has been joined to certain ideas at various times, and suggests how it has played a central role in shaping relations between religious groups in a society where religion is disestablished. The approach here is eclectic, blending historical narrative with cultural analysis, and the essay proceeds thematically rather than chronologically. Focusing on the feeling of emptiness allows a fresh perspective on religious practice in America, prompts new questions about belief and community, and enables new lines of interpretation for the development of religious ideas in America. Christians, Buddhists, Jews, and other religious communities in America have distinct ways in which they interpret the feeling of emptiness as a spiritual phenomenon. Religious persons often conceptualize it as an emotional experience of great value. Among Christians, it is important as a sign of an emptying of the self of immorality, distractions, and worldly clutter in preparation for being filled with the grace of God. Accordingly, Christians and others in America have developed spiritual disciplines aimed at cultivating the feeling of emptiness and advancing it to a point where deep longing becomes deep fulfillment. Religious practices involving the body include fasting, which is emptying the body of food, and tears, which empty the body of fluids. Bloodletting is also a notable practice, and, for those who do not cut or otherwise make bloody sacrifice (including war and lynching), bloodletting nevertheless is revered as a model discipline of emptying. There are aspects of sexual practices and the performance of work that also are exercises in self-emptying. All such disciplines are expected to prompt and enrich the feeling of emptiness. The severe fast, the deep feeling of emptiness, the desperate longing, the distancing from God becomes, paradoxically, a drawing closer to God. From the earliest settlement of North America, white Europeans and their descendants constructed the emptiness of the land to match the emptiness of their souls. Americans claimed to feel space. They expressed the spiritual feeling of emptiness in ideas about North America as a barren desert, crying to be filled by colonists and their descendants. The Great American Desert, a fiction created in the early 19th century, was one way in which Americans continued to imagine space as empty and themselves, as God’s exceptional nation, as the agents of fullness. American fascination with millennialism was a valorization of the fullness of eternity over the emptiness of history. Millennial movements and communities in America felt time as they did space, and when American Christians felt historical time they felt its emptiness. Americans have constructed elaborate and richly detailed depictions of the end as they look forward to a time when empty time will become eternity, fullness. Christian groups in America, populated by persons who cultivate emptiness, have defined themselves largely by saying what they are not. Both persons and communities, invested in the feeling of emptiness, mark personal and collective boundaries not by projecting into the social world a pristine essence of doctrine so much as by pushing off from other groups. Committed to emptiness, there is little to project, so the construction of identity takes place as an identification of Others. Such a process sometimes leads to the demonization of others and the production of identity through the inventorying of enemies.
