From Ignorance to Emptiness

　　March 27, 1964

　　Today I”d like to take the opportunity to tell you some of my own ignorance and doubts, with the thought that we all come from the land of ignorance and doubt inasmuch as our parents and their ancestors before them were people with the defilements (kilesa) that led them to ignorance as well. Even all of us here: There”s probably not a one of us who slipped through to be born in the land of intelligence and freedom from doubt. This being the case, we all must be subject to doubts. So today I”d like to take the opportunity to resolve some of the issues that are on your minds by giving a talk instead of answering the questions you have asked from the standpoint of your various doubts, ranging from the most basic to the highest levels -- which I”m not sure I can answer or not. But the questions you have asked seem to follow so well on one another that they can provide the framework for a talk instead of a question-and-answer session.

　　Each of us, before starting the practice and in the beginning stages of the practice, is sure to suffer from ignorance and doubt, as these are the qualities that lead to the states of becoming and birth into which all living beings are born. When we lay the groundwork for the beginning of the practice, we don”t have enough starting capital for intelligence to take the lead in every situation, and so ignorance is sure to find an opening to take the lead. And as for this ignorance: If we have never trained our intelligence to show us the way, the ignorance that holds the upper hand in the heart is sure to drag us in the wrong direction as a matter of course.

　　In the beginning of my own training, I felt doubts about whether the teachings of the Buddha -- both the practices to be followed and the results to be obtained -- were as complete as he said they were. This was an uncertainty that ran deep in my heart during the period in which I was debating whether or not to practice for the really high levels of Dhamma -- or, to put it bluntly, for the sake of nibbana. Before I had considered practicing for the sake of nibbana, these doubts hardly ever occurred to me, probably because I hadn”t yet aimed my compass in this direction. But after I had ordained and studied the Dhamma -- and especially the life of the Buddha, which was the story of his great renunciation leading to his Awakening to the paths (magga), fruitions (phala), and nibbana; and then the lives of the Noble Disciples who, having heard the Dhamma from the Buddha, went off to practice in various places until they too gained Awakening, becoming witnesses to the truth of the Buddha and his teachings -- when I had studied to this point, I felt a sense of faith and conviction, and wanted to train myself to be like them.

　　But the training that would make me be like them: How was I to follow it

　　 The Dhamma -- in other words, the practice that would lead the heart to awaken to the higher levels of Dhamma like the Buddha and his disciples: Would it still produce the same sorts of results or would it be fruitless and simply lead to pointless hardship for those who practiced it

　　 Or would it still give the full results in line with the well-taught teachings (svakkhata-dhamma)

　　 This was my primary doubt. But as for believing in the Buddha”s Awakening and that of his disciples, of this I was fully convinced in my way as an ordinary run-of-the-mill person. The thing that formed a stumbling block to me in the beginning stages was the doubt as to whether or not the path of practice I would take, following the Buddha and his disciples, would lead to the same point they had reached. Was it now all overgrown with brambles and thorns

　　 Had it changed into something other than the Dhamma that leads away from suffering (n…

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