An Examination of the “middle way” ...OR...Offering of my understanding
In this diagram, all the arrows are views, or schools, looking at the middle of this circle. School means established, shared views on a shared object. Before these arrows gathered, there was no middle, and no circle. It has no existence other than a dependant one, nothing of “its own.”
Since those views are from various vantage points, they each have a different appearance of the middle. Because of this, when they interact with other views, there is conflict and disagreement.
Upon analysis, there is no basis for conflict because there is never a shared object between any of the various views looking towards the middle of this dependant circle. Each view has its own uniquely appearing aspects and characteristics, different from the others, and so the appearing object is different for each. And the qualities and characteristics that compose this so-called middle itself exist only in dependence upon the viewers. Thus when I say there is no shared object, I mean no commonly appearing object. Since there is no shared object, there is no basis for agreement or disagreement.
It seems that the only agreement is that there is in fact an object, and although that assertion does not withstand analysis, it is completely true from their viewpoint. Being “true from their viewpoint” means that it is true that they have the appearance and conception of the object as such. For us, this is called “truth” or “reality,” but those who have understood the ultimate have given it the name, “completely false truth.”
When someone new approaches such a circle and asks, “What’s going on over here? What is everyone looking at?” he is given an explanation by one of the views looking at the middle. More often than not, this new person becomes occupied with understanding this view, rather than examining the middle for himself. Instead, this newcomer should move around the circle until he finds a viewpoint of the middle which suits him.
“What is my view? Which school should I follow?” However something appears to you, is your view; whichever school asserts tenets that match this appearance, is your school. We have no choice about which school to follow, or which view to follow. We have a choice whether to be honest, or to hide behind the assertions of others. When we are honest about what appears, and begin to examine this “middle” from our own vantage point, we become those arrows which compose the circle.
As part of the “circle,” any subsequent assertions about the “middle” are only statements of how it appears from our own viewpoint. What can we say about this middle itself? The only fully true statements we can make are to assert that the middle is not fully in accord with any of the views, and also not closer or farther from any of the views. We can only speak in negation, because we are in fact negating something that did not ever exist.
If we become free of this, “circle,” what is it like to abide in this “middle?” Upon examination, is it really a middle? Does it have any characteristics that make it a middle? In fact, when referring to a circle, the meaning of “middle” is understood as that aspect equally far from all points that form the circle. So practicing the “middle way” would not be a tangible middle in itself, but a freedom from the extremes of the encircling view. This is why Nagarjuna said “I prostrate to Gotama who, having abandoned all view, displayed the act of showing the Dharma.”
