Namaste. So, we’ve been dipping in the ocean of emptiness [laughs], just a little bit. Although it’s only a dip, it seems like the deep end of the pool, right? Well, now we’re going to stop messing around in the pool, and we’re actually going to go out in the ocean. So, this is taking a deep dive into the source material, the Buddha-suttas on emptiness.

I remember one time I went out in a boat with some friends beyond the island of Guam, beyond the coral reef, out into the ocean. And there’s a shelf, the Marianas Shelf, then that drops off into the Marianas Trench, which is the deepest part of the ocean in the whole world—36,000 feet or something like that, and basically it’s just like a cliff, it goes straight down. I remember diving off the boat and going down the cliff wall, and we were looking for shellfish and whateve—and feeling the immensity of the Marianas deep... I mean, it was just such an awesome feeling. I think it had a lot to do with the sound. Just like you can hear if somebody puts a lot of reverb or something, it sounds like a big space. Well, this was the biggest space I ever heard—just awesome. And I looked up, and there was a whole school of barracudas swimming over my head! [laughs] “I think I want to see some daylight here!” [laughs]

Anyway, for those of you who are allergic to emptiness, you should tune out right now! [laughs] Because this is going to get really deep, and there are lots of barracuda... [laughs] But for those who have an appetite, who have a taste, then this is going to be wonderful, because we’re going to go through the whole sutta. And even though it’s called The Shorter Sutta on Emptiness, it’s actually quite long, and it goes step-by-step, by degree, to introduce you to the concept of emptiness; the apophatic teaching. Instead of the positivist teaching of being in the Vedas, it’s going to be the apophatic teaching of emptiness. So, here we go: check your tanks, check your regulator [chuckles], blow all the water out of the breathing tube, and let’s jump in!