Ti-ts'ang asked Fa-yen, "Where are going?"
Fa-yen said, "Around on pilgrimage."
Ti-ts'ang said, "What is the purpose of pilgrimage?"
Fa-yen said, "I don't know."
Ti-ts'ang said, "Not knowing is nearest."
(Zen mondo)
Innocence
Taoism and
zen recognise that there is absolutely
nothing wrong with not knowing.
Modern culture is obsessed with the notion that everything can and should be
known.
Yet, realistically, how much do we really
know?
How much can we know?
Knowledge
In terms of
education, a person can be tutored to
degree standard and beyond.
A degree is 1/360th of a circle.
No graduate ever knows 1/360th of any given subject, no matter how hard they
study.
They know far less.
Postgraduate study narrows the field of expertise further still.
You know more and more about less and less.
The danger with knowledge is that it is always partial, incomplete.
It is simply not possible to know
anything through and through.
This is an aspect of the human condition.
Truth
Reality
is often referred to as 'truth' because it is not subject to
any form of interpretation.
We never comprehend the
truth.
The truth is everything, all at once, at each moment of our existence.
Do you see?
Information overload.
No human can experience the absolute
immediacy of truth.
Our brains cannot process the sheer volume of information contained in every
single moment of our lives.
There is simply too much to understand it all, to know it all, to remember
it all.
To even try is a folly.
Honesty
People
resist the fact of
not knowing because they wish to seem
clever.
Realising that everything cannot be known may feel like an admission of
stupidity, but it is not.
Stupidity is believing that you can know it all.
If somebody asks you a
question and you do not know the answer,
say so.
Do not
lie,
bluster or make
something up.
Admit the
truth. It will liberate
you.
Life is so much
easier when you come to
see that there is no way you could possibly know everything about
everything.
Not knowing is inevitable.
Arrogance
Arrogance is based on fear.
People
cling to a slither of knowledge and parade
it as though it were the entirety.
A doctor may seem clever until you ask them to mend your car, and a tai chi
master may seem
gifted until you ask them to discuss subatomic physics with you...
Specialism is necessary in life.
It is the only way to gain advanced knowledge in a narrow field of focus.
Do not be
proud of what you know.
A genius in one area is potentially a fool in all others.
Lao Tzu wrote that we find balance by realising that our
knowledge is fragmentary.
Nobody
knows it all. Even if they
think they do.
Ignorance
There is a difference between
innocence and ignorance.
Innocence is the
natural condition of not knowing
whereas ignorance is the pretence of not knowing.
Consider tai chi...
Innocence is when you have no idea that something exists or should be
trained.
Like a new starter who is unaware that tai chi was designed for self defence.
Ignorance is when you know that tai chi should contain internal strength and
should be applied in self defence, but you choose to not learn these skills.
Rather than undertake a complex course of new study, you
pretend to be unaware.
Ignorance is the act of ignoring the existence of relevant information.
You know it is there but you pretend that you do not.
Page created 19 January 1998