Buddhist totality and Buddhist emptiness

pp. 167-170

in: Alfonso Verdu, The philosophy of Buddhism, Berlin, Springer, 1981

Abstract

In the past chapters sporadic allusion has been made to the process of "complementarity" as it deploys itself within the infinitesimal realm of subatomic structures. Quantum mechanics and the relativity theory have confirmed that no component of the atom can be adequately understood or explained except through the "totality" of its relations to all other components. Buddhism purports that this claim must be evinced also in regard to the macrocosmic universe and to the human consciousness which this universe houses. As language embodiments of a self-expressing reality, no Buddhist school, no Buddhist founder, no Buddhist thinker can be thoroughly understood except within the "totality" of their relations to one another and within the process of complementarity which has produced a historical view of existence such as that which is called Buddhism. No singular milestone in the history of Buddhist thought - including the Buddha himself - can be considered a totalitarian source of authority in the expression of truth. The "totalitarian" attitude is the disease of dismembered perspectives, each one claiming apodicticity for its own cornered vision.