Middle Way Philosophy in Buddhism
Created | Updated Oct 4, 2006
This article will give a brief description of the Middle Way (Madhyamika) philosophy of Buddhism, according to Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama.
The central question is: where does the world come from? If we understand this, we can get some purchase on issues like: how can I improve my life? How can put an end to my problems forever? How can I help others do likewise? Conversely, if we don't know what makes the world (and ourselves included) as it is, we cannot really get to grips with these issues; we must always be somewhat in the dark.
The philosophy of Buddhism is not intended to be a dry, heady, intellectualisation, but a deep, incisive, heartfelt investigation of what is, in order to free ourselves. The language normally used is quite technical and pretty opaque unless one has a good teacher to unravel it. It is, afterall, the high tide of a great religious-philosphical tradition of Asia.
There are four ancient schools of philosophy in Buddhism - these are philosophical stances rather than actual institutions. They are Vaibashika, Sautrantika, Cittamatra and Madhyamika or Middle Way. Within this fourth school - held to be the highest of the four - there are two sections: the 'Indepedant Group' (Svatantrika) and the 'Absurd Consequence Group' (more often called the Consequence Group - Prasangika - or 'Highest Middle Way').
In a nutshell, the Middleway schools answers the question "Where does the world come from" by denying that the world exists independently of the mind perceiving it. The Highest Middle Way group (to which H.H. Dalai Lama aligns himself) says that everything we experience in the world, including our own inner life - objects, people, feelings, thoughts, moods etc - is a reflection (or projection) of our minds: the quality of experience - whether it is pleasant or not - is a result of the 'seeds' we have 'sown' in our consciousness by our past words, actions and thoughts. Thus if I am feeling happy today, it is the result of taking care of others in the past. THis is becase the act of taking care of others plants seeds in the consciousness which will flower into the experience of a pleasant world.
Though things are a projection, that doesnt mean they dont exist. A knife will still cut me and it will hurt! What it does mean is that the experience of seeing a knife, being cut, bleeding, feeling pain and distress ... this is the flowering of a seed that I planted in my consciousness in the past. Perhaps not even in this life, but in previous lives.
This is why - for our own sake - we need to take care of other people: to protect life, respect relationships, respect people's property, be honest, talk to lift people up and bring people together, talk of meaningful things, be content with what we have, celebrate other people's successes, and remember that the world is as it is for us because of how we have thought, spoken and acted in the past.
Hence the name Middle Way: it is a way of viewing the world that passes between the two extremes of thinking that a) things exist 'out there' objectively, and b) things don't exist at all.
The central question is: where does the world come from? If we understand this, we can get some purchase on issues like: how can I improve my life? How can put an end to my problems forever? How can I help others do likewise? Conversely, if we don't know what makes the world (and ourselves included) as it is, we cannot really get to grips with these issues; we must always be somewhat in the dark.
The philosophy of Buddhism is not intended to be a dry, heady, intellectualisation, but a deep, incisive, heartfelt investigation of what is, in order to free ourselves. The language normally used is quite technical and pretty opaque unless one has a good teacher to unravel it. It is, afterall, the high tide of a great religious-philosphical tradition of Asia.
There are four ancient schools of philosophy in Buddhism - these are philosophical stances rather than actual institutions. They are Vaibashika, Sautrantika, Cittamatra and Madhyamika or Middle Way. Within this fourth school - held to be the highest of the four - there are two sections: the 'Indepedant Group' (Svatantrika) and the 'Absurd Consequence Group' (more often called the Consequence Group - Prasangika - or 'Highest Middle Way').
In a nutshell, the Middleway schools answers the question "Where does the world come from" by denying that the world exists independently of the mind perceiving it. The Highest Middle Way group (to which H.H. Dalai Lama aligns himself) says that everything we experience in the world, including our own inner life - objects, people, feelings, thoughts, moods etc - is a reflection (or projection) of our minds: the quality of experience - whether it is pleasant or not - is a result of the 'seeds' we have 'sown' in our consciousness by our past words, actions and thoughts. Thus if I am feeling happy today, it is the result of taking care of others in the past. THis is becase the act of taking care of others plants seeds in the consciousness which will flower into the experience of a pleasant world.
Though things are a projection, that doesnt mean they dont exist. A knife will still cut me and it will hurt! What it does mean is that the experience of seeing a knife, being cut, bleeding, feeling pain and distress ... this is the flowering of a seed that I planted in my consciousness in the past. Perhaps not even in this life, but in previous lives.
This is why - for our own sake - we need to take care of other people: to protect life, respect relationships, respect people's property, be honest, talk to lift people up and bring people together, talk of meaningful things, be content with what we have, celebrate other people's successes, and remember that the world is as it is for us because of how we have thought, spoken and acted in the past.
Hence the name Middle Way: it is a way of viewing the world that passes between the two extremes of thinking that a) things exist 'out there' objectively, and b) things don't exist at all.
