The Buddha’s Middle Way; Experiential Judgement in his Life and Teaching; Ellis

Robert M. Ellis [+–]

Middle Way Society

Robert M. Ellis is author of a range of interdisciplinary books on Middle Way Philosophy, both within and beyond Buddhism. These have included The Buddha’s Middle Way: Experiential Judgement in His Life and Teaching (Equinox Publishing, 2019) and Archetypes in Religion and Beyond: A Practical Theory of Human Integration and Inspiration (Equinox Publishing, 2022). He is also founder of the Middle Way Society and of Tirylan House Retreat Centre in Wales.

The Middle Way can be understood from the Buddha’s life as well as his teachings. His early life follows a symbolic quest through the extremes of the Palace and the Forest, followed by the discovery of the Middle Way. His similes, such as the raft, the lute-strings, the arrow, and the blind people with the elephant are not just allegories of Buddhist teachings, but relate closely to the universal human experience of balanced judgement.

This book also has a critical case. Although it has transmitted the Middle Way, the Buddhist tradition has also often ignored or distorted it. The Middle Way is experiential, authentic and creative, and thus threatening to the power of a tradition that has instead emphasised the Buddha’s authority as a source of abstract, absolute revelation. The Buddha’s Middle Way aims to differentiate the universal Middle Way from Buddhist tradition.

Preliminaries

Acknowledgements [+–] vi

Robert M. Ellis

Middle Way Society

The Middle Way was first taught explicitly by the Buddha. It is the first teaching offered by the Buddha in his first address, and the basis of his practical method in meditation, ethics, and wisdom. It is often mentioned in connection with Buddhist teachings, yet the full case for its importance has not yet been made. This book aims to make that case. The Middle Way can be understood from the Buddha’s life as well as his teachings. His early life follows a symbolic quest through the extremes of the Palace and the Forest, followed by the discovery of the Middle Way. His similes, such as the raft, the lute-strings, the arrow, and the blind people with the elephant are not just allegories of Buddhist teachings, but relate closely to the universal human experience of balanced judgement. This book also has a critical case. Although it has transmitted the Middle Way, the Buddhist tradition has also often ignored or distorted it. The Middle Way is experiential, authentic and creative, and thus threatening to the power of a tradition that has instead emphasised the Buddha’s authority as a source of abstract, absolute revelation. The Buddha’s Middle Way aims to differentiate the universal Middle Way from Buddhist tradition.

Foreword [+–] vii-viii

Stephen Batchelor

Buddhist teacher and writer

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STEPHEN BATCHELOR is a contemporary Buddhist teacher and writer, best known for his secular or agnostic approach to Buddhism. Stephen considers Buddhism to be a constantly evolving culture of awakening rather than a religious system based on immutable dogmas and beliefs. In particular, he regards the doctrines of karma and rebirth to be features of ancient Indian civilisation and not intrinsic to what the Buddha taught. Buddhism has survived for the past 2,500 years because of its capacity to reinvent itself in accord with the needs of the different Asian societies with which it has creatively interacted throughout its history. As Buddhism encounters modernity, it enters a vital new phase of its development. Through his writings, translations and teaching, Stephen engages in a critical exploration of Buddhism’s role in the modern world, which has earned him both condemnation as a heretic and praise as a reformer.

Introduction

Introduction [+–] 1-7

Robert M. Ellis

Middle Way Society

The Middle Way is universal and can be discussed independently of the Buddha, but nevertheless, writing about the Buddha can provide inspiring access to it. This book uses Buddhist texts for their content rather than appealing to their authority, aiming to present the nature of the Middle Way through the Buddha and his teachings, and judging it by entirely pragmatic criteria. It builds on previous work about the Middle Way independent of Buddhist tradition.

Chapter 1

The Middle Way in the Buddha’s Early Life [+–] 8-49

Robert M. Ellis

Middle Way Society

This section offers a pragmatically based interpretation of the way in which the Middle Way can be found in the stories of the Buddha’s early life, and thus also ways that this story can reflect a universally available process of human development. After the Buddha’s origins in the Palace, representing absolutized conventional values, the ‘Four Sights’ introduce the necessary element of frustration that we require to break the closed feedback loops of habitual assumption. The Buddha then ‘goes forth’, initially in counter-dependent reaction to the Palace. His subsequent recognition of the limitations of his spiritual teachers and of the fruitlessness of asceticism prepares him for the discovery of the Middle Way, taking him beyond that polarised reaction into increasingly integrated balanced awareness. It is argued that the Buddha’s discovery of the Middle Way, not his Awakening, is the crucially significant moment in the Buddha’s development, because it offers a universal method whereby absolutising assumptions of all kinds can be integrated by embodied contextualisation. The Middle Way is analysed into five interdependent principles. A case is made for the interpretation of the Awakening that follows in the story in terms of its archetypal meaning, rather than as a basis for absolutising belief that would conflict with the Middle Way.

Chapter 2

The Middle Way in the Buddha’s Ministry [+–] 50-93

Robert M. Ellis

Middle Way Society

This section continues the pragmatic interpretation of stories of the Buddha’s life, focusing on selected aspects of his later approach that illustrate the application of the Middle Way. The Buddha’s decision to teach in his own right reflects the provisionality and incrementality of his Middle Way, avoiding any absolutisation in response to the huge difficulties in communicating it. His first address to others begins with the Middle Way, and it is argued that the Middle Way is needed to interpret the Four Noble Truths in the remainder. The Buddha’s mode of teaching through his career was consistent with his recognition of the autonomy of the individual, each of whom needed to find the Middle Way in their own experience rather than by merely accepting an abstraction. The Buddha’s response to political conflicts suggests a simple extension of the integrative practice he offers to individuals, and a recognition of a variety of ideological values without absolutisation of any of them. As he approaches death, the Buddha manages to strike a balance both in his response to imminent death, and in the degree of responsibility he tries to take for his legacy.

Chapter 3

The Buddha’s Metaphors [+–] 94-134

Robert M. Ellis

Middle Way Society

This section interprets some key analogies of the Buddha in terms of embodied meaning theory, showing their relationship to different aspects of the universal Middle Way, and in the process illustrating the analysis of the Middle Way into the five principles of scepticism, provisionality, incrementality, agnosticism and integration. Metaphor is omnipresent rather than allegorically reducible to ‘literal’ teachings, and the effect of the Buddha’s metaphors needs to be recognised in embodied terms rather than allegorically. The Middle Way itself is a metaphor combining basic schemas of source-path-goal and equilibrium. The Buddha’s raft metaphor evokes a universal experience of provisionality, and the lute-strings a basic expression of provisionality in the embodied experience of moderated tension. The man pierced by an arrow evokes the distracted irrelevance of absolutisation, and the ‘second arrow’ metaphor the accentuation of suffering by absolutisation. The gradual shelving of the ocean evokes the organic experience of incrementality, in contrast to the abstraction required for discontinuity. The blind people and the elephant evoke the universal power of confirmation bias through the metaphor of sensual limitation, whilst the snake simile evokes the dangers of absolute interpretations of the teachings. The saturation of a piece of wood with the more flexible medium of water evokes the way in which integration can guard against the fire of absolutisation.

Chapter 4

Issues in the Buddhist Interpretation of the Middle Way [+–] 135-169

Robert M. Ellis

Middle Way Society

This section offers arguments against several dominant but unhelpful interpretations of the Middle Way in the Buddhist tradition. Initially there are two basic philosophical issues to deal with: the misunderstanding of scepticism and the ontological obsession. Scepticism has been misunderstood in both West and East, because it is widely assumed to imply denial, indecisiveness or extremity, but scepticism merely implies the basic embodied recognition of uncertainty. Buddhist accounts of the Middle Way also unnecessarily focus on claims about how things are rather than on the process by which we judge them, resulting in an inefficient proxy for the Middle Way at best. There are then three aspects of the traditional interpretation of the Middle Way in Buddhism that are argued to be inadequate. The range of absolutes considered (so as to be avoided) is inadequate, because the absolutes considered by Buddhist tradition are often unnecessarily limited to those discussed by the Buddha, with a failure to update them to the wide range of absolutes affecting people today. It is also assumed that all absolutes must cluster into ‘eternalism’ and ‘nihilism’, but positive and negative absolutes can actually cluster in all sorts of ways that cut across this assumed defining pair. Buddhist tradition also often assumes eternalism is the second choice, so does not treat positive and negative absolutes even-handedly. ‘Skilful means’ arguments do not entirely justify the preference for eternalism.

Chapter 5

Interpreting the Eightfold Path [+–] 170-192

Robert M. Ellis

Middle Way Society

This section surveys the dependence of the practical path on the Middle Way, which is needed for its helpful interpretation. The Eightfold Path provides one possible way of describing the practice of integration, with all elements needing to be treated as incremental and interdependent. In the sphere of meditation, concentration and mindfulness need to be held in balance, without either being absolutised against the other, whilst right effort involves a further awareness to ‘tune the lute’. In ethical practice, the precepts need to be interpreted as part of the wider path and not absolutised as ends in themselves. This includes not repressing our awareness of others as persons. Thus the Middle Way is required to interpret Buddhist ethical injunctions. In relation to wisdom, right view and right aspiration are interdependent, and require combined intuitive, cognitive and emotive engagement with the Middle Way rather than just ‘knowledge’ of Buddhist doctrines.

Chapter 6

Interpreting Buddhist Teachings [+–] 193-241

Robert M. Ellis

Middle Way Society

This section explores the implications of using the Middle Way as the starting point for interpreting the other teachings in Buddhism – ones that have often been interpreted without it, and given unhelpful priority over it. Conditionality teachings can reflect the ontological obsession, and thus be a placeholder for provisionality. However, they can also offer helpful ways of interpreting phenomenal relationships. In terms of the Middle Way, dukkha implies the inadequacy of closed feedback loops, anicca the need for a wider temporal perspective, and anatta the need for agnosticism about metaphysical claims. Buddhist confusion about whether there are ‘good’ and ‘bad’ forms of desire can be resolved by an integration model in which it is the association of desires with absolutisations that makes them impossible to integrate. Karmic claims can only avoid absolutisation if they are general and provisional rather than top-down deductions. Rebirth can symbolise closed feedback loops but cannot be an object of belief. The recorded historical Buddha has a degree of credibility rather than absolute authority. As an image he also has a function similar to that of the God archetype. It is most helpful to interpret the Buddha-image as an archetype of the Middle Way itself. The ambiguities between three senses of ‘dharma’ are very likely to lead Buddhists to take it absolutely as ‘truth’ and to discourage provisionality: so it may be better to avoid the term. The discontinuity between monastic and lay Buddhism reflects the absolutisation of enlightenment, maintains power structures and does little to address group biases. Commitment is necessary to spiritual practice, but in Buddhism it too often takes an absolutised form as belief in the Buddha’s enlightenment. The Refuges could be helpfully interpreted as commitments to the Middle Way, its potential and supporting community.

Chapter 7

Alternative Sources of the Middle Way [+–] 242-280

Robert M. Ellis

Middle Way Society

This section offers brief accounts of ten alternative sources for the Middle Way, to illustrate the ways in which it is universal and independent of Buddhist tradition. These alternative sources for the Middle Way are neither total nor exhaustive, and may need to be seen in relation to each other – but then the same applies to Buddhist sources. (1) Pyrrhonian scepticism involves a balanced avoidance of positive and negative absolutes, though it doesn’t entirely avoid a reliance on conventionality. (2) The potential for the Middle Way in Christianity can be found especially in the symbolism of Christ as going beyond human and divine absolutes, as well as in the sceptical emphasis in some of Jesus’ teachings. (3) The Middle Way is explicit in Jung’s ‘Red Book’. A Jungian account of absolutisation is the projection of archetypes as separate from us, and the Middle Way cultivates integration by acknowledging archetypes. (4) Falsificationism interprets science as making gradual progress by ruling out positive claims rather than confirming them, thus employing open rather than closed feedback loops. (5) Systems theory provides a powerful means of contextualising and critiquing absolutisations. The Middle Way can be seen in systems theory as the adaptation of an organism moving in the direction of (but not achieving) homeostasis. (6) ‘Cognitive linguistics’ shows our beliefs to be rooted in embodied meanings and thus that absolute metaphysical claims depend on mistaken assumptions about meaning as independent of the body. (7) A neuroscientific account of the distinct specialisations of the brain hemispheres support an understanding of absolutisation as created by the over-dominant left hemisphere, isolated over time and integrated by the right. (8) In the study of cognitive bias, ‘fast thinking’ as the cause of absolutising bias needs to be integrated by ‘slow thinking’, which allows wider attention rather than merely ‘rationality’. (9) Ellen Langer’s independently-researched Western ‘mindfulness’ involves cultivation of novel and creative distinctions. ‘Mindlessness’, on the other hand, involves absolutisation. (10) Finally, a series of Western thinkers, including Mill, Dewey and Sartre, have contributed to the liberal concept of individuality, developed through provisionality and integrative dialogue in democracy.

End Matter

Conclusion [+–] 281-283

Robert M. Ellis

Middle Way Society

The Middle Way has massive implications for every area of thought and practice. It is universal because it depends on human structure and functions. It is synthetic in nature, implying that our understanding of its application in each area of experience will feed into the others. For Buddhists, an emphasis on the Middle Way in interpreting their tradition can make it more universally adequate.

Bibliography [+–] 284-290

Robert M. Ellis

Middle Way Society

Index [+–] 291-319

Robert M. Ellis

Middle Way Society

Reviews

In The Buddha’s Middle Way, Robert M. Ellis re-issues the Buddha’s teachings as a practical philosophy in the classical sense – a guide to sane and optimal living, rather than a religious doctrine or mere armchair musings. His middle way is a present-day life well lived, and his book is a convincing and valuable aid to finding and cultivating it. Though his erudition is striking, he writes clearly and accessibly. This is a book for both practising Buddhists and anyone who seeks to live an examined life.
Winton Higgins, senior teacher, Sydney Insight Meditators and associate, School of International Studies, University of Technology Sydney

I hope this provocative book will encourage Buddhists to reconsider the Middle Way that lies at the core of their tradition and to appreciate how this principle links their tradition to many others, both ancient and modern, secular and religious. The Buddha’s Middle Way will at the same time provide an excellent critical introduction to the Buddha’s life and teaching for those less familiar with Buddhism. As a result of Ellis’s groundbreaking work, the Middle Way may cease to be thought of as an exclusively Buddhist idea but a universal legacy of being human.
From the Foreword by Stephen Batchelor, author of Buddhism without Beliefs

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The Buddha’s Middle Way

Experiential Judgement in his Life and Teaching

Robert M. Ellis [+–]

Middle Way Society

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