The nothingness (_s'ûnyata_) of things may be viewed from seven aspects--(1) that they are always interdependent, and hence have no special characteristics by themselves, and as they cannot be determined in themselves they cannot be determined in terms of others, for, their own nature being undetermined, a reference to an "other" is also undetermined, and hence they are all indefinable (_laksanas'ûnyata_); (2) that they have no positive essence (_bhâvasvabhâvas'ûnyatâ_), since they spring up from a natural non-existence (_svabhâvâbhâvotpatti_); (3) that they are of an unknown type of non-existence (_apracaritas'ûnyatâ_), since all the skandhas vanish in the nirvana; (4) that they appear phenomenally as connected though non-existent (_pracaritas'ûnyatâ_), for their skandhas have no reality in themselves nor are they related to others, but yet they appear to be somehow causally connected; (5) that none of the things can be described as having any definite nature, they are all undemonstrable by language (_nirabhilapyas'ûnyatâ_); (6) that there cannot be any knowledge about them except that which is brought about by the long-standing defects of desires which pollute all our vision; (7) that things are also non-existent in the sense that we affirm them to be in a particular place and time in which they are not (_itaretaras'ûnyatâ_). There is thus only non-existence, which again is neither eternal nor destructible, and the world is but a dream and a mâyâ; the two kinds of negation (_nirodha_) are âkâs'a (space) and nirvana; things which are neither existent nor non-existent are only imagined to be existent by fools. This view apparently comes into conflict with the doctrine of this school, that the reality is called the tathâgatagarbha (the womb of all that is merged in thatness) and all the phenomenal appearances of the clusters (_skandhas_), elements (_dhâtus_), and fields of sense operation (_âyatanas_) only serve to veil it with impurities, and this would bring it nearer to the assumption of a universal soul as the reality. But the _La@nkâvatâra_ attempts to explain away this conflict by suggesting that the reference to the tathâgatagarbha as the reality is only a sort of false bait to attract those who are afraid of listening to the nairâtmya (non-soul doctrine) [Footnote ref 1]. ___________________________________________________________________ [Footnote 1: _La@nkâvatârasûtra_, p. 80. 150