Namaste. So, you might think that “Well, what is there to know about emptiness?” [laughs] I mean, how much can I say about emptiness, right? Well, it’s like name-&-form. I looked up on the suttas all the suttas having to do with emptiness, and there’s maybe a thousand of them... So emptiness is actually a very important topic—and we haven’t even started to cover it from the Vedic side.

So, emptiness is a big deal. Why is it such a big deal? There’s nothing to it! [laughs] But the point is when we attain the realization of emptiness, that stops the creation of sankhārā. The Buddha created a gradual series of meditations called the jhānas, more and more subtle, and finally leading to complete emptiness. So, is that Nibbāna? No. Listen to this:

“Since Nibbāna is called the stilling of all preparations, sankhārā, sabbasankhārasamatha, one might sometimes conclude that the attainment of the cession of perceptions and feeling, saññāvedayitanirodha, is in itself Nibbāna. But it is upon rising from that attainment, which is like a deep freeze, that one makes contact with the three deliverances: the signless (animitta), the desireless (appanihita), and the void (suññatā).”

—Bhikkhu K. Ñāṇananda, Nibbāna the Mind Stilled