Notions of Truth: Universal Motivations and Particular Approaches
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It is hardly controversial to say that there are motivations that all humans share, motivations that serve as the bedrock of any fulfilling life. For example, throughout all of human history, we find human beings valuing truth, art, community, creativity, and love, just to name a few. It is powerful to realize that we all have the ability to feel these universal motivations. That being said, without an explicit dedication to intra-cultural study and receptivity, this admittedly powerful recognition can remain limited; we may not realize that even these universal motivations and values can be approached from many different angles and that these different angles will manifest as radically different ways of engaging with life.
In my college years, the universal motivation that I held most dear was that of the search for truth. At the time, the sole avenue through which I explored this yearning was western philosophy. I had always been deeply inspired by questions such as: What is the universe? Does God exist? What is the meaning of life? These “big” questions had always intrigued me and I was able to explore them in the philosophy departments at universities where I was enrolled as an undergraduate and later as a graduate student. Although I continue to have the utmost respect for the western philosophical tradition, looking back, I find that the exclusive focus on western methods of thought and analysis in my philosophy departments silently suggested that all human beings throughout history had approached these big philosophical questions in the same way: with the aim of answering them through intellectual analysis. It was not until I broadened my horizons by looking into non-western thought and practices that I began to see that my way of approaching truth which aims primarily at conceptual understanding was not at all universal, but embedded within a very particular cultural and historical tradition.
To clarify what I mean, I will use an example from the Buddhist world:
The Pāli Canon is a collection of oral discourses given by the Buddha that were later recorded and compiled by a group of his students. In one of these discourses, the Cūḷamālukya Sutta, one of the Buddha’s students asks the very same types of questions I was exploring in my college years. This young monk Malunkyaputta asks the Buddha if the cosmos is eternal or finite, what the relationship between the soul and the body is, and whether a fully enlightened being is born or reborn. What is important for our purposes is that over 2000 years before I began to study philosophy, this monk had the same motivation and impulse; he was searching for truth in the form of answers to metaphysical questions. Initially, this phenomenon seems like proof of the universality of the conceptual quest for truth- that is until the Buddha answers Malunkyaputta’s questions.
Instead of answering directly, the Buddha responds to the young monk with a story. He asks Malunkyaputta to imagine a man who has been shot with an arrow smeared with poison. A friend comes and asks the wounded man if he would like help removing the arrow. The wounded man refuses help, stating that he will not remove the arrow until he knows the name, cast, height, and hometown of the man who shot him. The Buddha likens Malunkyaputta to the seemingly insane man who refuses to remove the arrow in his side. Seeking an answer to these questions, the Buddha implies, is no different than asking trivial questions while bleeding out from an arrow wound. The Buddha explains himself further, pointing out what he does have to offer to Malunkyaputta in place of answering these philosophical questions,
“And what is disclosed by me? ‘This is suffering,’ is disclosed by me. ‘This is the origination of suffering,’ is disclosed by me. ‘This is the cessation of suffering,’ is disclosed by me. ‘This is the path of practice leading to the cessation of suffering,’ is disclosed by me. And why are they disclosed by me? Because they are connected with the goal, are fundamental to the holy life. They lead to disenchantment, dispassion, cessation, calming, direct knowledge, self-awakening, unbinding.”
The Buddha offers to help remove the arrow; to bring relief to the sense of lack and restlessness, (or dukkha in the original Pāli,) that caused Malunkyaputta to get so wrapped up in these questions in the first place. The Buddha contends that answering these questions will not satiate this sense of lack and dissatisfaction, this dukkha. The cause of suffering, according to the Buddha is not the lack of philosophical knowledge but clinging (or taṇhā in the original pali.) The Buddha’s diagnosis is quite simple, dukkha is caused by clinging to any thought that arises in the mind or any perceptual object that comes in contact with one of the five physical senses. The prescription, the remedy for the “cessation” of dukkha, is also simple. We stop clinging to these thoughts and objects; we let them come and go without getting worked up or taking them too seriously. Thus, we can see why the Buddha refuses to answer Malunkyaputta’s question; Malunkyaputta has latched onto these thoughts that take the form of philosophical questions and thinks answering them will bring relief. However, from the Buddha’s point of view, nothing will bring relief except the end of taṇhā or craving, and it is taṇhā that causes Malunkyaputta to think answering these questions even matters in the first place.
At first glance, it may seem as if the Buddha simply has a different fundamental motivation than Malunkyaputta, my past self, and the western philosophers I studied. We may think that Malunkyaputta and the western thinkers are interested in truth while the Buddha is interested in peace or happiness. However, if we take the Buddha’s words seriously, we see that this is not the case. The Buddha does not only say that the release of clinging leads to “cessation of dukkha” and “calming” but also to “direct knowledge” about the nature of reality and “self-awakening.” If we want to take the Buddha seriously, we must admit that he does not simply care about something other than the western philosopher. The Buddha cared about and contemplated the truth as much as any western philosopher has. That said, the Buddha’s teaching actually also contains a challenge to the very ability to grasp truth through thought; which is the very foundation of much of western philosophy. If clinging to sense objects and thoughts not only leads to dukkha, but also shields us from truth, the cognition of truth is not a matter of intellectual knowledge in any sense. From the Buddha’s perspective, our cognition of ultimate truth is inversely proportional to the amount of craving and clinging to the thoughts in our mind; no matter how sophisticated those thoughts may be.
Even though I am admittedly pretty on board with the Buddha’s teachings, the purpose of this post is not to tell you that the Buddha is right and the emphasis on the intellect of the West is wrong; this is something we each have to explore and decide for ourselves. However, what I do hope to point out is that when we study other cultures/traditions/practices, we will learn the most by not only acknowledging the continuities but also looking for the discontinuities. It is this friction that arises between our worldview and another that holds the capability to shock us out of our complacency of thinking that there is only one way to look at the world. It also holds the potential to encourage us to consciously choose the orientations and approaches that resonate with us. Personally, when I took the Buddha’s exposition of truth and reality seriously, it opened up whole new vistas of exploration that would not have been available to me if I continued to cling to a limited cultural notion of how “truth” has to appear, that is, in some neat discursive metaphysical answer. This is just one of many experiences in my life that have led me to my conviction that studying systems of thought and practices other than our own with the intention of entering and taking seriously an entirely different world has great potential to help us live more consciously - and to inspire greater wonder and respect for this mystery called life.
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