大般涅槃經義記 6.31

6.31

Regarding "non-existence": first the question, next the explanation, and finally the general conclusion. In the explanation, it first clarifies that the marks of persons based on nominal designation are originally non-existent; "a foolish person..." and below clarifies that the marks of dharmas based on causal and conditional nominal designation are originally non-existent. In the former, there is first an analogy: "like a person without children saying the house is empty"; the mark of children is also absent, not merely lacking self-nature; through the ultimate observation of emptiness, there is no loved one, which is used to illustrate the dharma. This absence of the mark of a person is not the same as the absence of a personal nature in the preceding six emptinesses. In the latter, there is first an analogy: "foolish persons say the directions are empty" clarifies their difference; although fools say the directions are empty, in the limits of actual matters the directions are truly not empty. "An impoverished person says everything is empty" reveals what is shared; when an impoverished person says there are no things, the marks of things are also absent, not merely lacking self-nature. "Such views are either empty or non-empty" re-explains the preceding analogies: what the impoverished person views is truly non-existent, and so it is called "either empty"; what the foolish person views is in fact truly not empty, which is named "either non-empty". Below, it is applied to illustrate the dharma: "The bodhisattva's observation of emptiness is like the impoverished person's lack of things: everything is empty," which is not like the foolish person speaking of emptiness where there is no emptiness.