Madhyamaka, literally the “Middle Way,” is a major school of Mahāyāna Buddhist philosophy associated with Nāgārjuna. It is described as “middle” because it steers between the extremes of eternalism, which asserts a permanent, truly existing essence, and nihilism, which denies existence or meaning altogether. This middle stance is not a compromise between two dogmas, but a radical re-framing of how existence is understood. Rather than affirming or denying things in a crude way, Madhyamaka examines how phenomena appear and how they actually stand when analyzed with care.

At the heart of this approach is the teaching of śūnyatā, or emptiness. Emptiness here does not mean that nothing exists; rather, it means that all phenomena are empty of svabhāva, any inherent, independent, or unchanging nature. Things do not exist from their “own side” as self-established entities; they arise only in dependence upon causes, conditions, parts, and conceptual designation. Because everything is dependently originated and relational, nothing can be found to possess an isolated, fixed essence. This lack of intrinsic nature is precisely what is meant by saying that reality is “empty.”

Madhyamaka often articulates this vision through the doctrine of two truths: conventional truth and ultimate truth. On the conventional level, the world of everyday experience functions—beings act, suffer, and seek liberation. On the ultimate level, when phenomena are examined with rigorous analysis, no independent, self-existing entities can be found; only emptiness is discerned. These two truths are not separate worlds but two ways of speaking about the same dependently arisen reality, one oriented to practical functioning and the other to its deepest nature.

Philosophically, Madhyamaka frequently employs a method akin to reductio ad absurdum, revealing the contradictions that arise when inherent existence is asserted. Rather than constructing a new metaphysical system, it dismantles rigid views and conceptual proliferations that reify things. By exposing the impossibility of any fixed, independent essence, this tradition loosens the grip of attachment and aversion. The insight into emptiness thus serves as an antidote to ignorance, opening a way of seeing in which clinging to solid identities and views naturally subsides, and with that, the roots of suffering are gradually undermined.