Buddhist Wisdom Quotes

“Form is emptiness, emptiness is form.”
― Edward Conze, Buddhist Wisdom: The Diamond Sutra and The Heart Sutra

“The term fraud alludes to a saying of the Buddha which the Mahayanists were fond of quoting: "All conditioned things are worthless, unsubstantial, fraudulent, deceptive and unreliable, but only fools are deceived by them. Nirvana alone, the highest reality, is free from deception." Two classes of facts are here distinguished-the deceptive multiple things on one side, and the true reality of the Absolute on the other.”
― Edward Conze, Buddhist Wisdom: The Diamond Sutra and The Heart Sutra

“Form is emptiness, emptiness is form; emptiness is not separate from form, form is not separate from emptiness; whatever is form is emptiness, whatever is emptiness is form.”
― Edward Conze, Buddhist Wisdom: The Diamond Sutra and The Heart Sutra

“Buddhist tradition, in fact, distinguishes two classes of people, the "common worldlings" and the "saints" (arya), who occupy two distinct planes of existence, respectively known as the "worldly" and the "supramudane." The saints alone are truly alive, while the worldlings just vegetate along in a sort of dull and aimless bewilderment. Not content with being born in the normal way, the saints have undergone a spiritual rebirth, which is technically known as "winning the path.”
― Edward Conze, Buddhist Wisdom: The Diamond Sutra and The Heart Sutra

“The last five hundred years: It is well known from the Scriptures of all schools that after the Buddha's Nirvana the Dharma will progressively decline, and that every five hundred years a decisive change for the worse takes place... "The last five hundred years, when Buddhists will be strong in nothing but fighting and reproving, and the Dharma itself becomes practically invisible.”
― Edward Conze, Buddhist Wisdom: The Diamond Sutra and The Heart Sutra

“Subhuti asked: Will there be any beings in the future period, in the last time, in the last epoch, in the last five hundred years, at the time of collapse of the good doctrine who, when these words of the Sutra are being taught, will understand their truth?-The Lord replied: Do not speak thus Subhuti! Yes, even then there will be beings who, when these words of the Sutra are being taught, will understand their truth.”
― Edward Conze, Buddhist Wisdom: The Diamond Sutra and The Heart Sutra

“In the present period of history we find ourselves in one of the worst possible cosmic ages, with Buddhism in full decline, and the people everywhere singularly obtuse about matters spiritual, and incredibly dimwitted when confronted with the wisdom of the sages.”
― Edward Conze, Buddhist Wisdom: The Diamond Sutra and The Heart Sutra

“In fact, those who want to learn about wisdom must of necessity draw on the tradition of the fairly remote past. For centuries almost everyone has been silent on the subject. Philosophers, of whom some "love of wisdom" might be expected, have increasingly turned to the critical examination of knowledge, and are largely engaged in active disparagement of all that once passed of "wisdom." Nor has the effect of scientific and technical progress been any more propitious. What, indeed, could be more "unscientific" than the pursuit of wisdom-with its concern for the meaning of life, with its search for ends, purposes and values worthy of being pursued, with its desire to penetrate beyond the appearance of things to their true reality?”
― Edward Conze, Buddhist Wisdom: The Diamond Sutra and The Heart Sutra