Nagarjuna's Emptiness

This topic is about a core philosophical view in Buddhism. That view is that we habitually attribute to ‘things’, both ourselves (the way we see ourselves) and objects in the external word, an exaggerated sense of identity. We have a mistaken view that we, and objects in the external word, have an ‘inherent existence’ (the sanskrit the term is svabhāva). Buddhism argues that in reality objects do not have inherent existence – that are empty of this characteristic. This is sometimes abbreviated as the ‘Buddhist view of emptiness.”

This view was most fully articulated by the Buddhist philosopher Nagarjuna, who lived around 150- 250 CE.

• The main reading for the topic I suggest is Chapter 10 of Jan Westerhoff’s Nagarjuna's Madhyamaka: A Philosophical Introduction (The book was circulated earlier) – with Chapters 1 and 2 as introductions to Chapter 10.
• However since this topic is so different from the Western way of looking at things, before looking at Westerhoff I suggest reading the brief introduction to the topic I have put together, here: Preface to Emptiness - by Tom.pdf
• Finally in case you don’t have time to read Westerhoff or can’t stomach his writing (He’s a philosopher himself and so the writing style is pretty academic in flavour), I have attached a 2 page overview of Nagajuna’s view written by David Burton, here: Is Madhyamaka Buddhism Really the Middle Way - David_Burton.pdf
• There is a podcast by the Partially Examined Life guys on Nagarjuna on Buddhist “Emptiness” at http://www.partiallyexaminedlife.com/2010/10/10/episode-27-nagarjuna-on-buddhist-emptiness/