From: David Buchanan (DBuchanan@ClassicalRadio.org)
Date: Sun Aug 29 2004 - 02:25:26 BST
Scott, Paul and all:
Paul said:
As I understand :-) it, Nagarjuna used his logic to prove that nothing
that can be captured in a conceptual logical formulation can have an
inherent self-nature because it does not exist in isolation from
something else, everything depends on something else, e.g. its opposite,
for its identity i.e. all is, in itself, "empty." This goes on and on so
even existence and non-existence are seen as empty (this is the first
"truth") until eventually "emptiness" itself is shown to be empty, and
enlightenment occurs.
dmb adds:
Right. There's this idea that duality is essential to static reality. Its
interesting, perhaps, to note that the big bang has been described (I forget
where) as the moment when a perfectly balanced unity was shattered. All
would-be things and forces such as matter and antimatter were balanced in a
kind of symmetry of mutual annihilation, or rather a mutual denial of
existence. And then god knows what tipped the balance and BANG! The universe
began to unfold.
There is also the idea in Jungian psychology that each archetype, as it
exists in the unconscious mind, is sort incomprehensible to the conscious
mind until it is expressed as a duality. Its not clear to me how they think
they know such a thing, but the idea is that the original archetype is a
single, unified thing, but it cannot be presented to the conscious mind, or
even to the dreamer, without being shattered into opposites. I should add
that mythological material also expresses itself with a multitude of
conflicting forces in a complex motif, but I suppose these can be broken
down into sets of pairs of opposites, sets of dualities.
Paul said:
.........................................Following this logic, the
conceptualised static quality and the conceptually unknown Dynamic
Quality can not be distinguished for then they would be related to each
other as conceptual opposites. Thus, the second truth of Nagarjuna has
the consequence that this whole static world is ultimately identical to
Dynamic Quality, that there is really no division between static quality
and Dynamic Quality. Quite simply, if Dynamic Quality is undivided, it
can't be divided from static quality!
...The first truth of Nagarjuna teaches us to become free of the illusion
that the static world is itself real, while the second truth teaches us
that it is real after all, not in the sense in which we tend to think it
is, but in the sense it always has been.
dmb agrees and quotes Wilber:
"THE PERENNIAL PHILOSOPHY (the term was made famous by Huxley but coined by
Leibniz) - the transcentental essence of the great religions - has as its
core the notion of 'nonduality', which means that reality is neither one nor
many, neither permanent nor dynamic, neither seperate nor unified, neither
pluralistic nor holistic. It is entirely and radically above and prior to
ANY form of conceptual elaboration. ..Sri Ramana Maharshi had a perfect
summary of the paradox of the ultimate:"
The world is illusory;
Brahman alone is real;
Brahman is the world.
I think the world is Pirsig's static quality and Brahman is Dynamic Quality.
Together they are One, but we need the distinction in our static world of
metaphysical discussions nevertheless. Maybe the idea that the big bang was
the mother of all duality is just a poetic notion. And maybe those Jungians
are a bunch of crackpots. But even Pirsig, in laying down his monism, splits
the thing in two in his very first move. It seems there's no escape from
dualities and wood splitting is all we can do. Even when we're making a case
that reality is ultimately unified, we go chop, chop, chop. But hey, they
don't call it a paradox for nothing and nobody ever said ultimate reality
was easy to describe.
Thanks,
dmb
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