I’m looking at a quotation that has been attributed to the Buddha: ‘The no-mind not-thinks no-thoughts about no-things.’

That any statement can be made at all which comprises pure negatives seems incredible, for normal communication relies on content words to signify subject, verb, object, who’s doing what, to whom, where, when, why, etc. In this sentence, all the nouns and verbs have been negated by the no/not prefix, so that in effect, it is about nothing, being just an entire row of noughts, ciphers, zilches. Yet because it adheres to the familiar syntactical subject-predicate structure, we sense there is a meaning (just as we understand Noam Chomsky’s famous ‘nonsense’ sentence ‘Colourless green ideas sleep furiously’ )

I love these intellectually teasing puzzles, because in trying to understand them, my mind is challenged and invigorated. None can be more intriguing than this one from the Buddha, because in giving ontological status to nothing, it has cast into doubt our usual way of thinking about the world around us. It is as if he is saying, in a further use of riddles, ‘Nothing is not nothing, you know, it is something!’

I can understand this puzzle better if I remember that the emphasis on nothing—no mind, no thinking, no thoughts—may be just the enlightened sage’s way of warning us that in the end all the frenzy of human activity, all the achievements, all the artifacts created by him, come to nothing. Everything material is an illusion.

And just as the ontology of nothing means that it can be regarded as existing in its own right, so its corollary, emptiness, can be seen as having value in itself. I love the way that this truth is conveyed by a simple everyday example: ‘The value of doors, windows and cups lies in their empty spaces.’ Again, as in the case of nothing, the emphasis on emptiness is a warning against man’s tendency to be satisfied only with the concrete, the material, what he can easily see, weigh, quantify. Hence, nothing, emptiness, void, absence, etc., without any material meaning, has plenty of spiritual value.

Perhaps the best instance of the power of negation to convey the fundamental truths of our existence is in the mystic’s description of God. To convey the truth that God, being the Supreme Good, is beyond human language, He is described apophatically that is, through negating concepts only. Thus God is’ incomparable, immutable, inexpressible, incomprehensible, ineffable.

I love the ingenious use to which we human beings have put our greatest resource, language, taking it to a high metaphysical level where it can, paradoxically, describe what is indescribable, and confront our minds with puzzles that are unsolvable.

---

About Vignettes...

A continuing flow of little, readable pieces that will constitute what I feel is an important 'legacy of values' to leave behind. Read more about Vignettes...