Absolute Relativity

I am continuing my study of the Sutra of the Heart of Transcendent Knowledge and the Prajnaparmita Sutra in 8,000 Lines through reading Mother of the Buddhas: Meditation on the Prajnaparamita Sutra. I have already read Karl Brunnholzl’s The Heart Attack Sutra and read Andy Carr’s Contemplating Reality: A Practitioner’s Guide to Indo-Tibetan Buddhism. The Bodhisattva cannot excuse ignorance of these sutras with the plea that “I’m too busy trying to save the world to read obscure sutras.” Joanna Macy wrote her own reflections on the Mother of All Buddhas, the Prajnaparamita Sutra; the study and reflection of the prajnaparamita sutras became indispensable to her activist work.

I have posted a couple of evolving reflections on emptiness, emergence and compassion and will continue to post, edit and refine my writing here. But I wanted to offer a quick synopsis of where I come out on the issue of Absolute Reality vs. Relative Reality. First, Joanna Macy wrote in Mutual Causality: Buddhism and General Systems Theory that there is only one Reality and it’s all Relative. Other Buddhist scholars have a range of views on this issue. Karl Brunnholzl, if I read him correctly, says that there is only one Reality, and it’s Absolute, but the experience of Relative reality cannot be ignored by Bodhisattvas; rather, it has to be compassionately understood. Deal with people  in Relative Reality with Relative means. If I have misunderstood or misrepresented Karl’s work, please let me know in comments below.

My take on the issue is this: there is one Reality and it is Absolute Relativity. The simplest statement of Absolute Relativity that I can make is this:

impermanence is a permanent condition

the only thing that never changes is the fact that everything always changes

Both of these statements are self-contradictory paradoxes, and so they self-destruct, creating TOTAL EMPTINESS. [*poof*]

That’s Absolute Relativity in a nutshell.