Jonang exponents of the zhentong, or “other-emptiness,” view approach emptiness by making a careful distinction between conditioned phenomena and ultimate reality. All conventional, dependently arisen appearances—the aggregates, conceptual constructions, samsaric experiences—are regarded as empty of inherent existence, much like illusions. In this respect, they accept a rangtong, or “self-emptiness,” understanding of the conventional level: what is fabricated and conditioned lacks any true, independent essence. Yet this is only half of their picture, and it serves primarily to clear away clinging to what is deceptive.

Where Jonang thought becomes distinctive is in its account of ultimate reality, identified with buddha-nature or tathāgatagarbha. This ultimate is said to be empty only of what is “other” than itself—namely, ignorance, defilements, and all conditioned phenomena—but not empty of its own nature and qualities. Buddha-nature is described as beginningless, changeless in the sense of being beyond arising and ceasing, and endowed with inconceivable qualities such as wisdom, compassion, and bliss. These qualities are not produced newly on the path; rather, they are revealed when adventitious stains are removed. Emptiness, in this light, is not a bare negation but the unveiling of a luminous, non-dual presence that has always been there.

On this basis, Jonang thinkers criticize interpretations of emptiness that reduce the ultimate to a mere absence, a simple denial of existence. If ultimate truth were only a non-affirming negation, it would be difficult to explain how it could function as the ground of enlightenment, omniscience, and boundless compassion. For them, the ultimate must be a real, knowable dimension, rich with enlightened qualities, even though it lies beyond conceptual elaboration. Thus the two truths are articulated in a distinctive way: conventional truth is illusory and self-empty, while ultimate truth is truly established buddha-nature, empty only of what obscures it.

In practice, this understanding is cultivated through the Kalachakra tantra and associated meditative disciplines. Practitioners first train in seeing all conventional phenomena as dreamlike and insubstantial, loosening the grip of reification. On that basis, meditation turns toward recognizing and stabilizing the innate clear light mind, the luminous, aware nature that is taken as the direct expression of buddha-nature. The path is experienced less as constructing something new and more as uncovering what has always been perfectly present, once the veils of confusion are stripped away.