[Buddha-l] Re: The arrow: its removal and examination

[Katherine Masis]

Comments on what David Kotschessa wrote:

(a) "Not only does Buddhism have a clearly defined
goal, but it has already reached it!  As philosophies
go, Buddhism is finished.  There isn’t anything left
to figure out."

--That sounds pretty final to me, almost like a leap
of faith.  You seem to presuppose finiteness in human
systems—almost like presupposing the Greek concept of
perfection (completeness).--

(b) "The task we are given is to understand what has
already been 'figured out' and to clarify and manifest
it, and then, weirdly enough, to abandon it
altogether."

--So then there is no room for creativity, surprise,
wonder and the unexpected?--

(c) "No 'western' philosophy asks this of us.  They
appear, from my perspective, to wander on relatively
aimlessly, fascinating as they are, through
territories which may or may not be of any value
(relative to the goal of ending suffering)."
 
--Several western systems of philosophy do have the
goal of making life happier or at least more bearable.
 The stoics, epicureans and Aristotelians had that
aim.  Several contemporary western philosophies have
greatly influenced the way psychotherapy is practiced,
for example, Husserl’s and Merleau-Ponty’s
phenomenology.  I’ve only mentioned a few, but the
list is quite long.--  

(d) "My prediction is that philosophers will debate,
until the sun fizzles out, on the nature of truth. 
That is, unless they figure out that what they were
really trying to do in the first place was end their
suffering.   There will be a collective slap on the
forehead when (if) they realize the time they could
have saved, had they only oriented themselves to that
end in the first place."

--Well, that’s quite a prediction.  There are many
ways to alleviate suffering that work for different
people.  There is no "one size fits all" approach. 
Perhaps it’s a question of temperament.  What works
for one may not work for another.  I saw a Buddhist
typology with eleven categories in the Buddha-l
archives a few days ago, but for now the simpler Hindu
one will do.  For some folks, faith and devotion
(bhakti) is fine; for others, action (karma) will do,
yet for others knowledge (gñana) is the way.  And of
course, there are the mixes.  What I like about these
typologies is the deep respect they create: to
celebrate what one’s temperament is and to be aware
that the way out of suffering that one practices
honors it.  If the way out of suffering is the Noble
Eightfold Path, it would do us good to remember that
the path is eightfold, not one-fold!  Different
Buddhist sects emphasize different aspects of the
Noble Eightfold Path, with the assumption that those
emphasized aspects will naturally bring out the other
ones.  

Anyway, for some people the unexamined life would be a
life of suffering, so I don’t see any problem with
letting folks so inclined indulge in examining it
"until the sun fizzles out."--

Katherine Masis
San José, Costa Rica






       
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