 The nature of reality as depicted in these texts, and for the most part assumed as valid in Chan circles, does not fit comfortably into such customary Western philosophical categories as idealism, materialism and dualism. Common to all Buddhist traditions are the teachings of interdependence and karma. Strongly interpreted, to claim that all things arise and abide interdependently is to claim that relationality is ontologically more basic than “things-being-related”. That is, interdependence is not a contingent, external relation among essentially separate entities; it is internal or constitutive. As it came to be understood in China, interdependence entails interpenetration and individual existents are thus abstractions from already ongoing relational dynamics. Existence is relationality.