Buddhism has always propounded that emptiness is just form, form is just emptiness, and form and emptiness are one. The confusion between emptiness and form originates in science itself. When true principles are applied to analyze worldly matters, then the truth will be brought to light.

In a conference on Chinese and Western medicine, there was a dispute on the so-called flow of energy. Chinese medicine affirms its existence, whereas Western medicine adamantly denies it, since they find no evidence of it when they dissect a corpse. In the history of Chinese medicine, its practitioners have always prescribed treatment and cured illness based on diagnoses of the patient's energy flow. If the theory of energy flow is invalid, then there is no basis for their prescriptions. It was not until 1989 that a professor and a doctor at the Beijing Hospital jointly announced that the flow of energy does exist in human beings in an immaterial form. Various things in the world are not material. The so-called molecules, atoms, and fundamental particles are the most essential elements of all things in the world, including you and me. There is no exception at all. Man can neither create nor obliterate any kind of matter. If this is the case, then in what state do all things exist before they transform into a material form? How many different types of formless objects exist in the world? By what process do they come to take on material form? These are all to be explained. Therefore, one cannot pursue the reality without taking emptiness into account. Emptiness includes all phenomena, whereas the phenomena are only a part of emptiness. The emptiness is the reality (truth); form is only illusory. Take for example the waves on the sea: if we compare the sea to emptiness and the waves to form (phenomena), using wind as the cause and condition, we may say that the sea and the waves are not different, that the sea and the waves are one. When the sea is calm, we may say that although the waves have subsided, the sea still exists (waves are harbored in the sea). When we say that there are no waves, it is only that the shapes of the waves cannot be seen because they don't have any substance of their own. They merely appear with the wind and disappear when the wind is gone. This analogy depicts the oneness of emptiness and phenomena. Our universe is actually this way. It clearly points out the oneness as well as the boundary between emptiness and form. It also explains reincarnation and the indestructibility of matter, and consequently debunks the disguise of natural phenomena. Human beings, however, have been fooled by their old ideas for a long time. Their long-held ideas make it difficult for them to turn around, and they take false phenomena to be the truth. The Buddha pitied us and expounded suffering for us. That's profoundly meaningful. We should contemplate deeply on this.

→To be continued