Are we really 13.8 billion years old?
The world we stand in—this Sahā world of dust and longing—is said to have begun with the Big Bang, 13.8 billion years ago. But seen through Buddhist insight, that moment was not a chronological beginning so much as a breath—a pulse in the endless cosmic rhythm of seong-ju-goe-gong (成住壞空): arising, abiding, dissolution, and return to Emptiness.
Everything that comes into being must eventually pass away. Yet that passing away—that apparent state of nothingness—is never truly empty. Within it, the causes and conditions for arising quietly gather anew. The end of a universe is not a full stop; it is a transition before the next arising.
Jin-gong-myo-yu (眞空妙有): The nothingness that harbors existence
When the universe finally dissolves—utterly, completely—what remains is not absolute emptiness. It is something the Buddhist tradition calls jin-gong-myo-yu (眞空妙有): true Emptiness that is, paradoxically, wondrously full, which harbors the seeds of rebirth.
This state of Emptiness (Skt. Sunyata) is not absolute; it is a nothingness that contains existence—the entire possibility of what is yet to come. When the conditions of in-yeon (Kr. causality) ripen—when the right web of causes and connections matures—the switch for a new Big Bang is thrown, and space-time unfolds once more.
Imagine an infinite canvas of pure Emptiness. A single drop of ink falls. That drop becomes a point, the point becomes a line, the line becomes space, and from that space an entire universe is birthed into being. This is not metaphor alone. This is the truth the Dharma has always pointed toward.
The voice that never ceased
Have the teachings of Shakyamuni Buddha from 2,600 years ago truly vanished? Sound is a form of energy vibrating through matter, and energy is never destroyed—it only changes form. The frequency has merely weakened over time beyond our hearing, yet the vibration continues to flow through the cosmic Dharma-realm. If we possessed a measurement device on the scale of the Laniakea Supercluster, which harbours 100,000 galaxies, it would be physically possible to restore those ancient teachings hidden within the subtle tremors of spacetime.
What has disappeared from our sight has not disappeared from existence. This is the universe’s deepest truth: dissolution always retains within itself the seed of what was. Nothing is truly lost. The Dharma spoken once continues to resound.
Reincarnation below the cliff and practice toward the top
When a universe ends and is reborn, “souls”—the energy vibrating serenely within the state of Emptiness—emerge with the arising dharmakaya (The Cosmic Body of Buddha) to unite again with life.
Here the tradition offers us a crucial metaphor. Imagine a great cliff. Above: the original realm of fundamental Emptiness, our true home, the ground from which we originated. Below: the dharmakaya, the vast field in which we sentient beings move through life after life, death after death.
Once fallen below the cliff, it is extremely difficult for a being to climb back up by their own power. Therefore, we engage in Spiritual Practice (修行)—to return to that original realm of Emptiness.
Only the Enlightened One (the Buddha) returns to the world of Emptiness above the cliff through practice that halts the turning wheel of rebirth. We ordinary beings, still finding our way, dwell beneath, within the dharmakaya, reviewing the lives we have lived, and continuing the cycle of Samsara—meeting again the conditions that carry us forward into another life according to our karmic conditions.
Conclusion: Providence of the endless cosmic Dharma-realm
Even if this universe were to end tomorrow, it would arise again through in-yeon (Kr. causality). Causes and conditions would ripen. The drop of ink would fall once more.
Concepts of time are mere human conventions; from the perspective of Emptiness, there is only the maturation of causes, the gathering of conditions, and the inevitable arising of the rebirth that those conditions call into being.
We are not merely 13.8-billion-year-old finite beings; we are the eternal presence of the universe itself, taking temporary form, never ceasing, only changing. As the universe creates time and space by tearing through the void of non-existence at its reaches, perhaps on a planet in another universe, a being with a face very similar to mine is living another life.
When we truly understand this—when the magnificent working of the cosmic Dharma-realm becomes not just a concept but a living recognition—we find the courage and clarity to practice ceaselessly in earnest. Through that practice, we make our way back above the cliff, into the infinite, boundless freedom.
Venerable Tanmyeong, Zen seeker on the path
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