There Is Not, Never Was, A ‘Two’
On Absurdity, Paradox And Exalted Nonsense

I’ll let Zeno, the favorite of Parmenides [‘Venerable and Awful’], and a pioneer of the logico-mathematical paradox introduce this Site. Here he is explaining his new treatise to Socrates [469-399 BCE]:

‘It is…a defense of Parmenides against those who make fun of his ideas…this book is a retort against those who assert a Plurality…pays them back in the same coin with something to spare. For it shows that on a thorough examination, their own supposition that there is a Plurality leads to even more absurd consequences than the Hypothesis of ‘The One’.’ [Plato’s Dialogues: Hamilton and Cairns, Princeton, ’61]

Not-Two [A-dvaya] goes further than: ‘The One’ [Ekam]. But ‘The One’ is close enough for now. Conceptualized and reified it morphs into Abrahamic ‘Monotheism’. The Greeks abandoned their philosophers and followed St. Paul.

‘The Parmenides’ is considered the most difficult of the Platonic Dialogues. That is because Parmenides [and a few others; see the Posts] was alert to the Self-Loop and to which his modern interpreters are conspicuously innocent.

'The Objectivation Principle-the hypothesis of the real world..is a simplification where without being aware of it, we exclude the subject of cognizance from the Nature that we endeavor to understand.. which by this very procedure becomes the objective world. At the end ..I put myself which had constructed the world as a mental product, back into it- with the pandemonium of disastrous logical consequences that flow from this chain of faulty reasoning.. The antinomy cannot be solved at the level of present day Science..[which is] entirely engulfed [in it]- without knowing it.. Science must be made anew..'

Erwin Schrödinger [1887-1961]
The Schrödinger Equations; a Founder of Modern Physics; Nobel, 1933

‘The Objectivation Principle-the hypothesis of the real world..is a simplification where without being aware of it, we exclude the subject of cognizance from the Nature that we endeavor to understand.. which by this very procedure becomes the objective world.

At the end ..I put myself which had constructed the world as a mental product, back into it- with the pandemonium of disastrous logical consequences that flow from this chain of faulty reasoning.

The antinomy cannot be solved at the level of present day Science..[which is] entirely engulfed [in it]– without knowing it..Science must be made anew..‘

The Mahā Prajñāpāramithā Vajracchedikā
[‘Diamond-Cutter’] Sūtra

Man’s Oldest Preserved Printed Text
Ink on Paper, Cave 17, Donhuang, China

‘Reverently made for universal free distribution by Wang Jie on behalf of his two parents on the 13th day of the 4th moon
of the 9th year of Xiantong’ [May 11, 868, CE]

British Museum Library, London

Sūtra, cognate with ‘Suture’, a strung-together lock, was a mnemonic arrangement [hence the repetitious reinforcements], the anchoring reference to an oral teaching tradition.

The 300 Sloka [Sloka, a metrical unit of 32 syllables] recension of the MahaPrajñāPāramitha Sūtra, arguably the oldest and most influential of the larger Sūtras, is the above Prajñā Pāramitha Vajrachedika [‘Diamond-Cutter’] Sūtra.

The 25 śloka further and final compacting is the Hridaya [‘Heart’] Sūtra with its core verse, the Mantra of the PrajñāPāramitha. Its approach line births the seminal construct of Śūnyathā [also as: advaya-dharma: Not-Two].

From the above ‘Diamond Cutter ‘Sūtra: ‘The Tathagata has no formulated teaching to enunciate. Wherefore? Because the Tathagata has said that Truth is uncontainable and inexpressible. It neither is nor is-not. Thus it is that this Unformulated Principle is the foundation of the different systems of all the sages.’

‘Unformulated Principle’? A strange expression, for formulation is the essence of principle. We call such Logico-lingual terms: ‘Self-Eating Expressions’ [‘SEE’]. It is the universal phrasing for the intuition of Not-Two in the vocabulary of the speaker. See Posts for explanation and examples.

‘It Neither Is Nor Is-Not‘ is the extension of Yājñavalkya‘s algorithm [The rounded Negation: Neti:’It is not-this’] in the Brihadäranyaka Upaniṣad a millennia earlier. As the later Chinese Taoists [Hsi-tz’u] declared, it is: ‘Where Yin and Yang do not penetrate [we call it the Numinous]’.

‘Is and Is-Not’ is simply a reference to the foundational binaries, the interdependent bricks of Logic and Language that build our understanding of ourselves and our World. [Try and write a page without using the verb ‘Is’ [was, will be, etc; See Post: ‘The Ontological Elephant’].

The Inquiry begins with the First Cut, the opening binary upon which all other binaries mount: the ‘Subject-Object Divide’. And that in turn originates with the mundane claim to an ‘Independent [hence separated] ‘Self”, a comic conceit and a sanctioned vanity.

The pioneers, the First Inquirers were the men of religion, the original Learned Class. But there is nothing holy, sacred, spiritual, esoteric or mystical about Not-Two. There is nothing mundane, profane or banal about it either. But that is less often the slip. To limit it so is to abase its Truth.

According to legend, the illiterate Hui-neng [638-713 CE], the 6th Chinese Patriarch who pioneered the Path of C’han-Zen, found ‘Enlightenment’ upon his first hearing of the ‘Diamond-Cutter’Sūtra recited at a public square.

For the below excerpts I have chosen the simpler but remarkably precise A.F. Price and Wong Mou-Lam translation from the Chinese [1947]. The Sanskrit original [oral to script, between 500 and 300 BCE] first translated into Chinese in 179 CE is now long lost.

The language of the Sūtra, uniquely cognizant of the centrality of the Self-Loop is manifestly opaque to one unfamiliar with its intent. The ‘Self-Eating Expression’ is the principal, the only theme of the Sūtra. You don’t achieve Not-Two; you default to it. You come to terms with it.

On ‘Enlightenment’

Subhuti, what do you think? Has the Tathagata attained the Consummation of Incomparable Enlightenment?

Subhuti answered: As I understand Buddha’s meaning there is no formulation of truth called Consummation of Incomparable Enlightenment.’

Subhuti, what do you think? Does a holy one say within himself: I have obtained Perfective Enlightenment?

Subhuti said: No, World-honored One. Wherefore? Because there is no such condition as that called “Perfective Enlightenment’

‘Enlightenment’ is realizing that there is no such binary state as ‘Enlightenment’ in counterpoint to ‘Delusion’.

When you realize that clearly and convincingly, you are ‘Enlightened’; until you realize that, you are in ‘Delusion’.

On ‘Teaching’

‘Subhuti, do not say that the Tathagata conceives the idea: I must set forth a Teaching. For if anyone says that the Tathagata sets forth a Teaching he really slanders Buddha and is unable to explain what I teach.’

‘Subhuti, what do you think? Has the Tathagata a teaching to enunciate?

Subhuti replied to the Buddha: World-honored One, indeed, the Tathagata has nothing to teach’

The Teaching is realizing that there is no ‘Teaching’ towards such ‘Enlightenment’.

Every Teaching is ‘Eaten’, negated until there is no Teaching left. [See later Posts on Yājñavalkya’s Algorithm].

When you realize that clearly and convincingly, you have gained the Teaching; until you realize that, you are held back in class.

On ‘Acquisition‘

Then Subhuti asked Buddha: World-honored One, in the attainment of the Consummation of Incomparable Enlightenment did Buddha make no acquisition whatsoever?

Buddha replied: Just so, Subhuti. Through the Consummation of Incomparable Enlightenment I acquired not even the least thing; therefore it is called ‘Consummation of Incomparable Enlightenment’

‘Acquisition’ as meant here is the gaining of some imagined perfection, a sweet Elysium, a favored Life.

It begins on the assumption that someone is lost and needs to be found. In sin and in need of salvation, in error [avidya] and in need of realization, in chains and in need of release [mukthi].

Guru-Speak. Don’t let these ‘Lost and Found’ binaries get you stuck.

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