"While I am thinking about it there is a very good book on Buddhism recently
out called 'Buddhism, Plain and Simple', by Steve Hagen and published by Tuttle
Publishing. I recommend you get it because it shows the similarities, between
the MOQ and Zen Buddhism more clearly than any other I have seen."
(Pirsig to McWatt, May 6th 1998.)
---
"Nagarjuna, the brilliant Buddhist philosopher of second-century India,
wrote,
Those who do not understand the distinction between
[the] two truths do not understand the profound truth
embodied in the Buddha's message.
"These two truths are relative and Absolute Truth.
"Relative truths are the day-to-day things and thoughts we can easily
discuss, teach sell, and conceptualize. These include simple facts ---a foot
is twelve inches, oranges contain vitamin C, Mount McKinley is in North
America. But feet, inches, oranges, rocks, birds, feelings and thoughts, are
themselves also relative truths. Each one depends on a vast multiplicity of
other things, other concepts, other relative truths for its existence --- an
existence which is, of course, one hundred percent conceptual.
"Relative truths are the concepts we use to get an easy handle on the
world. They help us in our everyday lives with a huge variety of practical
matters. But the more closely we look at them, the less Real they show
themselves to be.
"Nevertheless, relative truths aren't to be avoided. They're not
necessarily evil, or harmful, or wrong. Indeed, they're essential. In order
to get through the day, we need to know things --- telephone numbers, store
hours, potatoes, growing seasons, fractions, love, speed limits, how to fasten
shoes. We run into trouble when we forget that all these things, thoughts, and
feelings are relative --- that they are not Real, independent entities at all.
They exist only in relation to other things, thoughts, and feelings. When we
refer to "this book," that is a relative truth. And we've already seen that
the more closely we examine what "this book" is, the more we can't pin it down,
and the more the "truth" of it dissipates like a morning mist after sunrise.
"Relative truths are why we fight wars, why we fear people who aren't like
us, and why we debate the abortion question but come no closer to a resolution
of it.
"Ultimate Truth, on the other hand, is direct perception. And what is
directly perceived (as opposed to conceived) is that no separate,
individualized things exist as such. There's nothing to be experienced but
this seamless, thoroughgoing relativity and flux.
"In other words, there are no particulars, but only _thus_.
"Ultimate Truth can't be conceptualized or imagined. You cannot hold
Ultimate Truth in your mind at all. You can _see_ It. You just can't hold It
as an idea.
"Ultimate Truth appears the same to all who _see_. It can't be countered
or doubted or discounted because it is immediate, direct experience itself.
It's not other-dependent. It has no "other." What's ultimately True can't be
held in opposition to something else.
"We can actually _see_ this. We can (and, in fact, we do) _see_ for
ourselves, right now, Ultimate Truth, and Reality. Our only problem is that we
ignore what we _see_.
-------------
(Hagen, Steve, ‘Buddhism: Plain and Simple’, pp.142-143)
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