reference and loneliness

The person without a range of reference is not more authentically human for being so. He is just more alone.
— Clive James, Cultural Amnesia, pg. 391

I picked this book up out of curiosity. In this instance, the curiosity has paid of manifold, for this rich, textured book contains fascinating accounts, observations, and insights into the lives and works of many who formed and shaped our cultural heritage, from Keats to Einstein, from Trotsky to Tacitus, both the famous and, at least for me, the obscure. An added bonus is James' writing style, a marvel of depth, beauty and simplicity on complex and often controversial topics.

This quotation struck me in light of the weight placed on no reference in Buddhist practice, e.g., non-referential awareness, or non-referential compassion. One may perhaps object that the word reference is being used in two different ways, but what happens if what if one considers that there may be something in common in the two phrases awareness that has no reference and the person without a range of reference?

In either case, one has a sense of open space, infinite, without center or circumference, a feeling that reminds me of the location in north-eastern New Mexico where I've taught retreats for the last few years, right at the edge of the Great Plains, where heaven and earth are somehow joined in the dusty blue of a distant horizon. When I walk out into the plains, there is no reference. One is completely alone, and, ironically, the very experience of aloneness is a reminder that this thing we call life consists of precisely of physical, emotional, and mental sensations arising from our interaction with the world around us.

To have no range of reference is to cut oneself off from life.

In an odd way, this quotation embodies the two most salient aspects of human experience: we have no idea what this experience is, yet we meet and respond (or react) to what arises in every moment of our lives.

Awakening? Peace? Truth? Freedom?

All that is conditioned is impermanent.
All emotional reactions are suffering.
All experience is empty.
To go beyond misery is peace.

The four seals, as these four lines are called, make it clear that the aim of Buddhist practice is peace. It is the end of suffering.

A prevailing myth in Western Buddhism is the maxim "know ye the truth, and the truth will make you free". This misleading Christian myth (John 8:32) can, perhaps, be laid at the door of Socrates and his followers. They envisioned an ideal world of forms in which beauty, goodness, and truth were one and the same. This sentiment has, in our age, led people to ignore the fact that the various values of a democratic society — equality, justice, freedom, etc. — often conflict with one another.

The myth is deeply embedded in the Western thought and, inevitably, has insinuated itself into Buddhist thinking in Western societies.

What leads one to embark on Buddhist practice? There is only one answer: a mind (or heart) that is not at peace. One may call the aim awakening, or freedom, or presence, but these are all misleading terms, each of them implicitly suggesting a "higher" or "truer" way of living, or being, or whatever.

We cannot know what is true. As Chuang Tzu says, "How do I know I'm not a butterfly dreaming that I'm Chuang Tzu?"

Awakening? The best we can do, as Wittgenstein said, is to awaken to the understanding that we are asleep and dreaming.

Freedom? The more clearly one sees things, the less choice one has. The illusion of choice is actually an indication of a lack of freedom.

Presence? When I say that I am present in a situation, I mean that I am not being distracted or torn apart by internal or external tensions, in other words, a kind of peace, no?

If you look at the actual experience that these terms refer to, you find peace, peace from the tension of not knowing what experience is, peace from the tension of feeling bound and conditioned, peace from the tension between subject and object, etc.

another view of tradition

A tradition is an accumulation through time of inspired works, created by people who do not have tradition on their minds. If they have anything on their minds, it is their own uniqueness: the ways they do not fit in, not the ways they do.

— Clive James

In Buddhism (and elsewhere), much is made of preserving tradition. I've long felt that there was  problem with this notion, namely, the things one tends to preserve are dead, perhaps to be eaten later, or only to be viewed in a jar of formaldehyde, or after being subjected to a process that preserves form, shape, and perhaps color but certainly not the thing itself.

This quotation, from Clive James' book Cultural Amnesia, is a delightful reminder that tradition is only a concept applied to a certain phenomenon. The phenomenon itself is created by people doing "untraditional" things — writing, painting, or teaching in ways that generate new energy, new responses, new possibilities.

Recently, an old colleague of mine called to describe how a group of people at a center had asked him to translate a text for their practice, and then had turned around and changed some of the words and phrasings in his translation to more "traditional" vocabulary. The translator here has long and deep experience and has come to understand how the "traditional" vocabulary leads people astray or limits their understanding of their practice (not just the text, but their practice). Against stupidity, even the gods struggle in vain.

In our culture, we try new things, find what works, and discard what doesn't. We go down wrong paths, we get into trouble, but we learn, through experimentation and innovation. When they limit themselves only to what is tried and true, most people in this culture grow restless and impatient, unless they die of stasis and boredom first.

Another one bites the dust

How many times have you heard that the Chinese character for crisis consists of the combination of the characters for danger and opportunity? Well, I came across this link recently. It effectively blows apart this particular folk etymology.

Folk etymologies play a significant role in Buddhism, particularly in the Tibetan tradition. The written Tibetan language was essentially created in 8th century for the purpose of translating Sanskrit texts into Tibetan. Written Tibetan is a direct import of an 8th century Bengalese alphabet, as you can see from the display of alphabets over the centuries in one of the Calcutta museums. 

More significantly, Tibetan Buddhist vocabulary was based on the folk etymologies of Buddhist technical terms in Sanskrit. This development endowed Tibetan with a power to express Buddhist ideas comparable to the power of a high-level programming language to express complex computer commands in succinct form. At the same time, Tibetan technical terms were completely divorced from the true etymological roots of the Sanskrit terms.

A good example is the word bhagavan, usually translated as lord. The original Sanskrit is derived from the root bhaga, which is also the root of the word vagina. The root means source, womb, matrix, etc. However, in Tibetan, the three syllables are given the symbolic meanings of conquer, possess, and transcend, conquering the reactive emotions, possessing the qualities of awakening, and transcending ordinary experience. No doubt this was the how the word was explained to the compilers of the first Tibetan dictionaries.

Of course, this development creates wonderful complications for present-day translators: do you rely on the original Sanskrit meaning(s) or the Tibetan symbolic meanings?

Success in practice?

But when the buffalo went away the hearts of my people fell to the ground, and they could not lift them up again. After this nothing happened.
— Plenty Coups, Crow Chief

Meaning in life is contingent upon the context in which we live our lives. A meaningful act in one context may not have any meaning in another. This was the dilemma the Crow faced when they had to give up their nomadic life and move to reservations. The actions that defined a warrior — horse-stealing, war, planting a coup stick, making an opposing tribe recognize the boundary of one’s range — no longer had meaning. It was not that one had failed at these actions. These actions had lost any sense of significance.

Such a shift is hard for most of us to imagine, yet, in both social and spiritual matters, we have definite notions of success and failure, of what gives meaning to life.

Socially, we usually define success in terms of happiness, prosperity, reputation, and respect.

What does it mean to “be successful” in one’s spiritual practice? Some might say it means to be awake, to be present. Others might say it means to have passed on faithfully the teachings, practices, understanding, experience, and rituals one received. Others might say it means to have developed a body of teaching and transmitted to a group of students who will transmit it in turn. Still others might say that it means to have lived one’s life without regret.

Is success the same in Zen, Theravadan, or Tibetan Buddhism, or are there differences? What about Buddhism as it is practiced in the West?

Spiritual practice, on the other hand, is concerned with the life we actually experience, the life that consists only of thoughts, feelings, and sensations, and the awareness in which these arise. In this life, what constitutes success or failure.

This is the parallel with Plenty Coups summation of what happened to the Crow. There is an important difference. The Crow did not seek the end of their life as they knew it. It was imposed upon them by the invasion of their territory by a materially more powerful people who had a different view and understanding of life. In spiritual practice, however, we intentionally seek to uncover the knowing in which our life as we know it comes to an end.

Rational Choice Theory and Teaching

Rational Choice Theory is the basis of much of economic and sociological theory. The theory is highly suspect in most choice situations. 

Much of Buddhism is presented and taught on the basis of RTC. Just look at the expositions in Jewel Ornament of Liberation, for instance.

If RTC is bunk, what do you do when teaching?

My sense is we need to move the emphasis to learning and away from teaching.

In other words, the primary task of the teacher is to create situations and environments in which people learn and build:

1. the possibilities and viability (addresses willingness) of venturing into the mystery

2. skills they need to do so

3. capacities they need to do so

What they do, then, is not up to the "teacher". The teacher has done his or her job.

What the teacher should not do is explain or try to convince the student that this is a good idea!

Buddhism and Science

The so-called debate between science and religion is better viewed as a conflict between modern and traditional cultures, the former looking to individual exploration and agency as guides, the latter relying on examples of past perfection as guides. 

Buddhism, it can be argued, was (is) the first modern religion. While in its institutional forms, it echoes the values and processes of traditional cultures, at its core, it's about individual exploration. As Buddha Shakyamuni said just before he died, "I've shown you a way. Work out your own freedom."

Recently, David Brooks, a columnist for the NY Times, wrote:

First, the self is not a fixed entity but a dynamic process of relationships. Second, underneath the patina of different religions, people around the world have common moral intuitions. Third, people are equipped to experience the sacred, to have moments of elevated experience when they transcend boundaries and overflow with love. Fourth, God can best be conceived as the nature one experiences at those moments, the unknowable total of all there is.

Here, in a nutshell, is the core of the tension. Traditional cultures hold their own religions and institutions special and sacred while modern cultures see these religions and institutions as particular expressions of universal principles. Traditional cultures object to the undermining of their specialness. Modern cultures object to the privileged status of a particular formulation in a pluralistic world.

You can read the whole of Brook's piece here.