ECHOES FROM AN EMPTY SKY
a review by Ted Arnold
Namgyal Monastery Institute of Buddhist Studies

Tenet system study is one of the best ways to absorb the complexity of Buddhist thought: it is that simple. But tenet system texts are not documents of history, nor are they meant to be, as Jim Blumenthal explains so well in Ornament of the Middle Way (Snow Lion 2004). Blumenthal shows that these have a soteriological value within a tradition that defies historical concerns, but when that function is mistaken -that is, when a claim intended to bring one to a certain temporary understanding is taken for fact-then sectarian bias may result.

This is precisely what occurred in the Gelug tradition, and what resulted was a muted backlash for several centuries, culminating in the Rimé movement of the 19th century. This is why at Namgyal Monastery Institute of Buddhist Studies, we take great care to approach tenet system study thoroughly, to avoid sectarian tendencies, in the spirit of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.

Thus John Buescher's Echoes From an Empty Sky, a wonderful new study of the two truths from the Vaibashika and Sautrantika perspectives, is welcome especially for its historical presentation. Buescher gives us the two truths in a general framework, discussing the early Indian context for the importance of the distinction between the ultimate and the conventional in both Buddhist and non-Buddhist systems. This is particularly useful in understanding how Buddhist tenet systems could diverge as well; we should remember that a system presented monolithically, more or less, by the Gelugpas over a thousand years later was in fact comprised of various thinkers with differing views.