by Pablo Lerner | Vol 43 (1/2) 2025
Abstract: This article revolves around the question of how the real should be conceptualized. More specifically, it argues that the real should be defined not solely vis-à-vis the symbolic, as that which resists symbolization, but equally vis-à-vis the imaginary, as that which resists imagination. This enables the author to distinguish between two forms in which the real may appear: the unnameable, which emerges correlative to the symbolic, and the unimaginable, which emerges correlative to the imaginary. Further, the author introduces a conceptual triad corresponding to internal voids inscribed within the symbolic, the imaginary, and the real, naming them silence, darkness, and emptiness. Using this triad, the author introduces a new way of conceptualizing the interrelations of the three orders, viewing them as relating to each other through their separations, to the extent that their internalized voids converge in the disjunction in-between them; for example, in the disjunction of the symbolic and the real, silence and emptiness converge. Lastly, it is postulated that there is a primordial void in the real which subsists outside and independent of the symbolic.
by Michael De Herdt | Vol 29 (1/2) 2011
Both Buddhism and psychoanalysis show us alternative ways to bear human suffering. Buddhism teaches us the path of emptiness (śūnyatā), psychoanalysis that of sublimation. In this comparative literature study we explore how we can conceptualize the realization (jñāna) of emptiness based on the psychoanalytic conceptual framework. For this comparison we respectively use Nāgārjuna’s Mūlamadhyamakakārikā and Lacan’s seventh seminar, supplemented with secondary literature. In the process of sublimation an object is elevated to the dignity of the Thing. In order to understand the buddhistic emptiness we make a distinction between the metaphysics of emptiness, indicating an intellectual understanding of emptiness, and the realization (jñāna) of emptiness, which refers to the meditative penetration of emptiness. When one realizes emptiness and one sees reality like it is, one is free of attachment (taṇhā) or fixation. We offer three psychoanalytic readings of the buddhistic emptiness. In a first reading we follow Lacan’s definition of sublimation and as such consider the Thing as a source of evil. This reading is compatible with the metaphysics of emptiness. In a second and third reading we adapt Lacans definition of sublimation by restricting the Thing to an empty and unknowable space. This is compatible with Lacan’s conceptualization of the Thing based on his reading of Kant’s Critique of the Practical Reason. This redefinition of the Thing in Lacan’s conceptualization of sublimation we conceive as the alternative sublimation. This adaption is necessary to understand what Buddhism means by the realization of emptiness.
