"Either/or" or "both/and".

[The Cobbler's Apprentice]

Now I don't want anyone trying to be clever and saying it's a bit of both.....

Let's try to keep it simple. The idea of this thread came from a spin off from the Flaming Swords thread over on Christianity. Here we can have a bit of topic drift. Tell me of your love of Chuck Berry if you choose. The Sugarbabes?

Anyway, I see "both/and" as being more in keeping with the Dharma, the "eastern" ways of being (or non-being). Either/or tends to drift towards Inquisitions, wars, persecution......this as those who are most definitely Right in an absolute sense ("one way" and all the rest of it) go for the jugular, no holds barred.

"Both/and" hopefully drifts towards the beauty of difference, where the "absolute" is found in the moment, in that moment only, at "one" with radical freedom, where every moment is "something new under the sun". Yun-men's "appropriate statement", the teachings of a whole lifetime.

I feel another quote coming on, this from Joshu (as far as I know Joshu was not in fact Jim Smith from Hackney but I can't be sure):-

"Remake what has gone by and work with what comes. If you don’t remake, you are stuck deeply somewhere."

A wonderful quote, pregnant with insight. Joshu or Jim Smith, I thank you.

Now over to Sky who can perhaps give a precise, short sharp word or two as an alternative to my own often pompous verbosity.

(It gives me something to do while sipping my cappuccino and while I do appreciate the ardent and ernest exhortations of the zafu sitters who say "when drinking, just drink" the Pure Land way just tends to let it all hang out and Amida takes the strain)

[sky]

Non think of 'Constant Flux'....

[The Cobbler's Apprentice]

Originally Posted by sky123

Non think of 'Constant Flux'....

Don't taunt me.......

[sky]

Originally Posted by The Cobbler's Apprentice

Don't taunt me.......

I had no intention of ' Taunting ' you or anyone.....

[snowyowl]

Is this about the tetralemma? If so count me in, I've trying to get my head round it for ages [/font]

[The Cobbler's Apprentice]

Originally Posted by snowyowl

Is this about the tetralemma? If so count me in, I've trying to get my head round it for ages

Never actually heard the word "tetralemma" before, but googling it does seem to have something to do with Nagajuna. If so, I think the main idea seems to be that its something you can't get your head round as such.

[sky]

The Buddha seemed to have used it as a way of covering all conceivable possibilites when He was teaching/describing something that's beyond the realm of conceptual language and thought. It's enough to give you a headache if you try to work it out

[The Cobbler's Apprentice]

Thomas Merton was musing upon the Madhtamika of Nagajuna while crossing the Pacific on his Asian pilgrimage.

“Its dialectic is of crucial importance. This dialectic is the consciousness of the total and interminable conflict in reason and the consequent attempt to resolve the conflict by rising to a higher standpoint.”

I think this even had the intellectual Father Louis, aka Thomas Merton, reaching for a drop of the hard stuff......(not that he had a drinking problem of course... )

It's been a hectic day. First reports are that my anchor just held.

[snowyowl]

Yeah, it pops up in Indian and Greek philosophy. Certainly is a challenge to binary logic which insists on things being either true or not true.

It takes me into the mind-bending world of paradox, having been brought up in a largely conventional Euclidian kind of world view. It feels like it's doing me good though!

But I haven't got it yet. I'm trying with ideas like non-existence. A statement like, "there are no apples in my lounge" is true in the sense that there aren't any. It's also not true in another sense, because it asserts the existence ('are') of non-existence ('no apples'). Maybe I'm just creating the appearance of paradox with a clumsy use of language though, I'm not sure.

[The Cobbler's Apprentice]

Originally Posted by snowyowl

Yeah, it pops up in Indian and Greek philosophy. Certainly is a challenge to binary logic which insists on things being either true or not true.

Logic has never been my strongpoint......which just might give me a headstart....