Contents: INSIGHT INTO EMPTINESS BY Khensur Jampa Tegchok
Introduction	1
An Overview	2
The Origins of this Book	5
A Note on Terminology	6
Appreciation	6
1 THE BENEFITS OF LEARNING ABOUT AND MEDITATING ON EMPTINESS	7
Motivation	7
The Sources of This Teaching	8
The Benefits in General	9
Admiration for the Profound	9
The Three Doors of Liberation	11
Benefits According to the Sutras	12
2 WHY REALIZING EMPTINESS IS IMPORTANT	17
Background	17
Taking Refuge	18
Cyclic Existence: The Five Aggregates and Six Realms	21
Ignorance, Afflictions, Karma, and Liberation	23
Renouncing Duhkha and Its Causes	25
The Root of Cyclic Existence	28
The Four Noble Truths	29
3 ENTHUSIASM FOR EMPTINESS	33
Understanding Emptiness Is Crucial	33
The Danger of Misunderstanding Emptiness	36
Doubt Inclined Toward Emptiness	38
The Power of Realizing Emptiness	39
More than One Way to Practice	41
Confidence	42
4 LOOKING AT THE LANDSCAPE	45
The Four Seals	45
Aryadeva's Advice	47
An Overview of the Levels of Selflessness	49
The Buddha as a Skillful Teacher	51
The Value of Reasoning	53
Emptiness Is an Obscure Phenomenon	54
5 WHAT IS A PERSON?	57
The Person	57
Persons and Phenomena	58
The Five Aggregates	59
The Continuity of Consciousness	62
Who Is Joe?	63
No Permanent, Unitary, and Independent Self	63
Impermanence: Coarse and Subtle	65
The Meaning of "Unitary" and "Independent"	68
The Lack of a Self-Sufficient, Substantially Existent Person	70
6 SEARCHING FOR THE PERSON	73
The Basis of Designation and the Designated Object	73
An Inherently Existent Person Can't Be Found	74
The Illustration of the Person	76
The Illustration of the Person, the Mere I, and the Continuity of Mental Consciousness	80
The General I and the Specific I	82
7 INVESTIGATING THE I	85
Ignorance and Wisdom	85
The Valid I-Apprehending Mind and the Erroneous I-Grasping Mind	86
Valid and Mistaken, but Not Erroneous	89
The Self that Exists and the Self that Doesn't	91
Independence and Imputation	93
8 EXPLORING SELFLESSNESS	97
Selflessness in the Four Schools	97
The Two Midle Way Schools	99
Mere Imputation Without the Slightest Existence from Its Own Side	103
Mere Name	108
9 IMPUTED AND EMPTY	111
What Is This Fluid?	111
Not Findable, but Existent	113
Searching for the Cart	115
Appearing When Not Analyzed, Unfindable When Analyzed	117
How to Learn about Emptiness	118
10 ENLIGHTENMENT IS POSSIBLE	121
All Sentient Beings Can Attain Enlightenment	121
Adventitious Stains Can Be Eliminated	122
Inconceivable and Inexpressible	124
Combining Bodhichitta and Wisdom	125
11 EASING INTO EMPTINESS	127
A Review: How Ignorance Arises and Produces Afflictions	127
The Sequence for Meditating on Selflessness	130
Three Modes of Apprehending Phenomena	132
Dependent Arising Contradicts Inherent Existence	134
12 DEPENDENT ARISING	139
Nagarjuna's View	139
The King of Reasonings	140
Dependence on Causes and Conditions	141
Dependence on Parts	143
No Partless Particles	143
Dependent Designation	144
Mutual or Relational Dependence	145
Dependence on Imputation by Name and Concept	147
All Phenomena Depend on Mere Imputation	148
Emptiness and Dependent Arising	150
The Compatibility of Being Dependent and Empty	152
Is There a Choice?	153
13 THE FOUR ESSENTIAL POINTS	155
Meditation on the Four Essential Points	155
The First Essential Point: Identifying the Object of Negation	156
The Second Essential Point: The Pervasion	159
One and Different	160
The Third Essential Point: Are I and the Aggregates Inseparably One and the Same?	163
The Fourth Essential Point: Are the I and the Aggregates Totally Unrelated?	169
Expanding the Analysis	170
The Correct Conclusion	171
When to Reflect on Dependent Arising	172
14 HOW THINGS ARISE: REFUTING THE FOUR EXTREMES	175
Not Arising from Self	175
Not Arising from Other	177
Not Arising from Both	181
Not Arising Causelessly	181
Summary of the Four Extremes	183
15 EVER-DEEPENING UNDERSTANDINGS OF SELFLESSNESS	185
The Three Turnings of the Dharma Wheel	185
The Chittamatra Perspective	186
Subtler Meanings Revealed in the Three Turnings	189
The Four Reliances	190
Ever-Deepening Levels of Selflessness	191
Deepening Understanding of Dependent Arising	195
Phenomena Are Self-Liberated	197
Self-Emptiness and Other-Emptiness	198
16 APPEARANCES	203
Things Do Not Exist as They Appear	203
True and False	204
Minds and Their Objects	206
Analogies	211
Realizing It Does Not Exist as It Appears	212
Real and Unreal	213
Inferential and Direct Realization of Emptiness	215
Two Levels of Mistaken Appearance	216
17 REFINING OUR UNDERSTANDING OF EMPTINESS	219
Similes Showing the Five Aggregates Are Empty	219
The Refutation of One and Many	222
Perception is Not Truly Existent	223
Nothing to Remove, Nothing to Add	224
Avoiding the Views of Nihilism and Absolutism	225
Abandon Meditating on the Nonexistence of Anything At All	227
18 THE TWO TRUTHS	231
Basis, Path, and Result	231
The Two Truths	232
Conventional Truths	234
Ultimate Truths	235
Same Nature, Nominaly Different	236
Truth and Truly Existent	240
Conventional and Ultimate	241
19 SIMILES FROM THE DIAMOND CUTTER SUTRA - PART I	243
The Simile of Star	244
The Simile of a Visual Aberration	246
The Simile of the Flame of a Lamp	249
The Simile of an Illusion	250
20 SIMILES FROM THE DIAMOND CUTTER SUTRA - PART II	255
The Simile of a Dewdrop	255
The Simile of a Water Bubble	256
The Simile of a Dream	257
The Simile of a Flash of Lightening	258
The Simile of a Cloud	259
Conclusion: See Conditioned Phenomena as Such	261
21 HOW FORTUNATE!	263
Meditating on Emptiness Is Crucial for Liberation	264
Powerful Purification	268
Notes	271
More Reading	275
Index	277
Bibliographies	281